


The Call of (sexy) Cthulhu

by LordMarble



Series: Risopro wholesome stuff [2]
Category: Cthulhu Mythos - H. P. Lovecraft, ジョジョの奇妙な冒険 | JoJo no Kimyou na Bouken | JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
Genre: Comedy, Crack Treated Seriously, Cthulhu!Risotto, Developing Relationship, Dialogue Heavy, Disabled Character, Domestic, Fantasy, Fluff, Love Confessions, M/M, Romance, Sexual References, Swearing, Tentacles, This is DUMB, but in a non-sexual context, monster au, no stands
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-12
Updated: 2019-09-28
Packaged: 2019-10-09 00:25:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 37,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17396624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LordMarble/pseuds/LordMarble
Summary: This is a 100% normal mermaid fic, starring a blond bitch baby and what’s probably, most definitely a sexy merman.Every ship hasthatMonster Fic™. This is Risopro’s.From the author of These Codenames are Stupid, she brings you the weirdest thing she’ll ever write.For now.





	1. What the Fuck?

To Prosciutto, the ocean is a terrifying place. He’s a 27 year old man who’s afraid of some salty water. 

For starters, it’s big. 70% of the fucking earth is ocean. Secondly, there are _scary_ fuckers in it like big ass sharks. Third, he can’t swim. He can’t even float because of how lean his frame is. Ironically, he lives by the sea and his brother Pesci is a fisherman. Occasionally, Pesci would come back smiling and show his Fra what awful shit lives in the ocean. 

For example, Pesci showed him a crab. Its soulless eyes pierced into Prosciutto’s own, waving those nasty pinchers and threatening to cut off his dick. He also showed him a sea hare— and it looked nothing like a cute, fluffy bunny. It was slimy and black and dripping with salty mucus. _Who the fuck thought sea hare was a good name for that thing!?_ At least Pesci seems fond of the… creatures. He adores them, really.

Perhaps Prosciutto’s least favorite of them all is the too-many-legged, amorphous and gooey abomination called the octopus. They do not follow the conventions of what should be normal or what is deemed holy by any god of any religious following. Their arms move without correlation with those necessary structures we call bones and they’re covered from base to tip with suckers that grip onto you and never let go. When you cut one off, they keep fucking squirming in time with your stomach turning. Their eyes are blank, yet whenever you make eye contact with them you can feel them judging you and your inferior intellect. For some reason, they have a beak. They can squeeze their fat blobby bodies through holes into your home to eat your children and fuck your wife. And, from what Pesci told him, they have three hearts and technically nine brains. 

What. The _fuck._ As a Catholic man, Prosciutto deems the octopus demonic.

To his disdain, one day Pesci needs Prosciutto to come with him on one of his fishing trips. That means they’re going to be out. On a boat. In the ocean. Where the abominations live. Several miles from the sweet safety of land. 

This brings us here to the present, a nauseous Prosciutto begrudgingly accompanying a chipper Pesci on a boat headed to the deep unknown. 

“Pesci, we are going to die.” Prosciutto complains, clinging to the boat’s side and looking into the blue sea that rocked him up and down with its awful waves.

Pesci, who is far too enthusiastic about fishing and the ocean and literally nothing else replies, “Fra, you’re being a baby! We’re not going to die. The ocean is too kind to hurt us!” He smiles gleefully, and Prosciutto doesn’t know if it’s out of excitement for the sea or sadism. 

“Well tell the fucking ocean she’s making me wanna hurl into her fat whore body,” Prosciutto hisses in response. The waves splash into the boat in a harmony, almost sounding like she’s calling him a whore back. 

“Fra! If you say things like that, bad things will happen to you!” Pesci exclaims. 

“Guess what, awful things are already happening and it’s the worst possible outcome,” Prosciutto flips the bird at the waves and spits into them, “besides the possibility of us dying.”

Pesci sighs. Then, being the optimistic cinnamon roll he is, he has an idea to try cheering up his Fra. His seasick, angry Fra.

“I’ll tell you what, Fra, I’ll catch you a mermaid!”

Prosciutto scoffs. “A mermaid? They’re as real as my wife. I don’t have a wife. Nor do I have a husband.”

“That’s the point, Fra!” Pesci says cheerfully, “I’m going to catch you the prettiest mermaid or merman in the sea and you’ll finally have someone to love! I know how lonely you are.”

“Isn’t that… kidnapping, Pesci?”

“Kind of! But that’s how a lot of mermaid love stories go. And I’ll leave the wooing to your handsome face and deep voice,” Pesci says nonchalantly as he throws a huge net over the side of the boat, “if we catch one, that is! I have super good luck fishing so I’ll make sure of it.” He walks to where Prosciutto stands and pats him on the back. 

Prosciutto raises a concerned eyebrow, but gives him a seasick smile. “Thanks, Pesci.”

“Anything to make you happy, Fra!”

_____

Hours pass, and dark clouds begin rolling in from over the wide horizon. The waves grow higher and the winds threaten to blow the sails away.

“Pesci. We are going to die.”

“Nonsense, Fra!” Pesci says rather cheerfully. He begins pulling the net from the sea, when lighting strikes a few miles away and it starts pouring heavy rain on the brothers.

“PESCI! WE ARE _GOING TO DIE!_ ” Prosciutto screeches like your average white suburban mom who wishes to speak to the manager. Before Pesci can respond, his Fra runs to the mast in a panic and opens the boat’s sails and starts a fast course for land. 

“Fra! You dummy, I need to check our catch to throw back anything we don’t need!” The boat is already at full speed by the turbulent winds before Pesci barely hauls the heavy net loaded with fish onto the deck (this is a huge net, but you know what else is huge? Pesci’s muscles).

“NO YOU DON’T! WE _ARE LEAVING._ ”

Pesci yells at him, but the rumbling sound of thunder screams over him with the battering rain and crashing waves.

______

The brothers are shaken from the severity of the storm, but they make it to land alive with their catch. The skies have cleared, and the sun is back out but not by much as it’s already setting over the horizon. 

Prosciutto is disheveled, exhausted, and sticky with seawater. His hair, which is always neat no matter what, is now in a disarray of greasy looking blond locks and salt.

Pesci is annoyed, which is a rarer phenomenon than a quadruple rainbow. He’s annoyed at Prosciutto, which is rarer than a quintuple rainbow with a leprechaun waiting at each end. The sentient pineapple thumb doesn’t say a word as he drags the huge and heavy net onto the beach.

“Pesci, I’m sorry—“

“Not a word, Fra. Not a fricking word.” Pesci grumbles.

 _Oh my God, he’s so upset that he said frick,_ Prosciutto thinks to himself. 

Pesci sighs. “I thought if I brought you along, Fra, you could get over your fear. Then we could spend more time together and you could keep me company on my trips.”

“...So you lied to me about bringing me along to help.” Prosciutto confirms.

“Well I knew you wouldn’t agree if I told you the real reason!”

“That implies that I’m a coward.”

“You ARE a coward! Which is hypocritical of me to say because I’m scared of everything BUT the ocean! But my point still stands, Fra!” Pesci folds his arms and pouts, upset.

“Fine, goddammit! I guess I am a coward since I’m scared of ONE fucker and the denizens that live in it!” Prosciutto lashes out.

“And you were being a dummy! A big dum-dum!” Pesci finally snaps.

“Dummy!? I’ll have you know that—“

“Be quiet, Fra!”

“Did you just tell me to be quiet!?”

“No! I mean shush!” Pesci puts a finger over Prosciutto’s mouth. 

Prosciutto eyes pop in surprise at his little brother’s actions. He’s confused, but when Pesci takes action something is up. The two go silent and hold their breaths.

There’s the sound of waves rolling into the shore, seagulls squawking and heavy, gasping breaths coming from beneath the nets. 

Prosciutto and Pesci don’t make a move.

With worry in his voice, Pesci whispers, “Did we catch a seal or a dolphin? But their breathing doesn’t sound like that.”

Prosciutto whispers back, “Maybe it’s that pretty mermaid you promised me.”

“If that’s a mermaid,” Pesci warily approaches the net with a stick in hand, “that’s a pretty buff mermaid.”

He pokes the source of the sound, and a jolting movement is made with an evil sounding hiss comes from the net. Pesci leaps back farther than Prosciutto can ever imagine. He hands the stick to his Fra, shaking.

“P-Please lift up the net for me, Fra.”

“No fucking way, Pesci.” Prosciutto looks up at Pesci, and he’s giving him the infamous puppy eyes. He’s too powerful. 

The blond inhales, and exhales deeply. _You can do this. It’s probably just a walrus or some other chubby creature. Hopefully it’s a mermaid. Hey, at least it’s definitely not an octopus. They can’t hiss. Nor can they breathe that loud. Right?_

He approaches the net with great caution. Inch by inch, he shuffles towards the net with the stick out on guard. He swallows and tries to keep his composure, mentally and physically bracing himself for whatever may come. Slowly, he pushes fish after fish in the way, levering the stick under the netting and carefully lifts it up with Pesci huddling close behind him.

Whatever preparation Prosciutto made wasn’t enough, and he throws the stick high into the air and screams in horror. Pesci screams too.

The heavy breathing is coming from a… a thing. A monster. It’s roughly humanoid with a black and white striped body, covered in reptilian scales. Bat-like wings protruded from its shoulders, and a long tail slithered down its backside. Curved, sharp claws ended its slightly webbed finger tips. It appears to be clothed, strangely enough. 

The most hideous part of this thing is its head. It’s an octopus, and we know how Prosciutto feels about those tentacled monstrosities. 

It’s unconscious as far as the brothers can tell. Its eyes are closed and it made no response to them screaming bloody mary. It’s also tangled in the net, so hopefully it can’t move and slash them up with its talons. 

Prosciutto is the first to speak with a disgusted twist in his voice. “I’ll go get the shotgun.”

“Fra! We can’t do that. It hasn’t done anything to us!” Pesci cries. 

“Yes it has! It almost gave me a goddamn heart attack!” Prosciutto yells.

“We can’t hurt it! It’s already hurt!” Pesci points at the creature, “Its wing is bent weirdly and it looks like the nets made a lot of cuts on it.” Trickles of what looks like blue blood drip out of its wounds.

“How do you know that’s not what it’s _supposed_ to look like.” The blond says skeptically and disturbed.

“I think when I poked it, it hissed out of pain…” Pesci says, feeling a little bit guilty. 

“So why don’t you put it back so the gracious kindness of Her Majesty: The Ocean can magically heal it. Or better yet, take it out of its _fucking_ misery.” The older brother grumbles sourly. Prosciutto can’t imagine the pain of having an octopus for a head. 

“No, we need to help it Fra! Our nets hurt it so I need to…” Pesci bravely walks past his Fra and cuts it free with a pocket knife, lifting up the injured creature with his bare fucking hands.

Prosciutto shrieks. “Put tHAT DOWN THIS INSTANT! PESCI!” But it’s too late, Pesci is making his way up the beach towards their house on the cliffs, ignoring the seagulls flying in to steal the rest of their catch in the net. 

“THIS IS THE _ONE_ TIME I DON’T WANT YOU TO USE THAT RESOLVE I TAUGHT YOU!”

____________

It’s in their house. The monster with the octopus head is in their fucking house. Pesci put it on the couch. The expensive leather couch. Where it can get all its goddamn disgusting slimy bits on.

Needless to say, Prosciutto fucking hates this. 

While the octopus-dragon-human thing is still unconscious, Pesci disinfected and patched its wounds up with bandages and wrapped a splint along its broken wing so it can heal properly, all the while ignoring the low groans and sharp hisses of discomfort that Prosciutto would rank as the same amount of pleasantness to hear as nails on a chalkboard.

Pesci went to bed shortly thereafter, but Prosciutto stays up. He can’t rest easy knowing that it could wake up and kill him in his sleep. Across the living room he stands, he fumes watching this damn thing lay deadass asleep on _his_ couch in _his_ house. It has the audacity to be snoring too, and Prosciutto is trying to figure out where its fucking nose is. Does it even have one?

As he stands there, he makes more observations of the monster. Minus the wings, it looks about 6’7” tall if it was standing. It appears to be well built, with heavy looking muscles and a wide chest. Are those nipples? And are those nipple piercings? Why the fuck would it have nipples?

Speaking of what’s on its chest, what the hell is it wearing? Its outfit is the definition of horrendous. It has a black trench coat only held together by straps that come together in an X over its pectorals. It’s wearing a belt with a golden R on it and striped black and white pants. It looks like it’s wearing a hat, too. On its ends are little golden bells with letters engraved into them. 

R-I-S-O-T-T-O. 

Is that its name? It’s a terrible one, but Prosciutto isn’t one to talk. 

His eyes start to get droopy with fatigue, so he takes a shotgun and lays down on the couch across from the monster. Clutching it close, he swears under his breath to shoot it in the head the second it opens its eyes. 

Then he blacks out.


	2. WHAT THE FUCK?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The monster awakens.

_A deep abyss in the dark sea, glowing emerald lights from strange sigils along the stone walls to an underwater city. Prosciutto peers down at the looming depths, standing on nothing above. In the echoing distance, he hears a chanting:_

_“Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn… Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn…”_

_“Hey, what the fuck is going on?” Prosciutto says out loud, and no water enters his lungs when he opens his mouth._

_The mysterious chanting continues. “Ïa! Ïa! Cthuhlu fhtagn!”_

_“HEY, WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON?” A whoosh of water pushes Prosciutto back, lifting him up to the surface of the ocean..._

Prosciutto wakes with a groan. He sits up, vision blurry with sleep and he rubs his eyes. The surreal dream has him really shaken up and for some reason, he can’t recall what happened yesterday—

“You are awake, human.” 

Prosciutto’s eyes snap open and he’s face to face with a hideous octopus. Ah, yes. That happened. 

_**“CAZZO!”**_ Prosciutto leaps on top of the couch like an oversized cat, nearly making it tip backwards. He scrambles for the shotgun and clumsily takes aim at its head, all the while forgetting to flip the safety off. The creature too, is awake. And it’s crouched down in front of the couch which, to Prosciutto’s horror, means that it was _watching_ him in his _sleep._

It stares at him blankly. Its irises are soul piercing red with black sclerae and slit pupils, as if it isn’t fucking Satanic enough already.

“Why are you aiming that weapon at me? I do not mean any harm, human.” It speaks in a rather deep, rumbling voice. Jesus _Christ_ , it can talk. Its tentacles move a little with every syllable. 

“IF YOU DO ANYTHING WEIRD, I WILL PULL THIS GODDAMN TRIGGER AND BLOW YOUR BRAINS OUT!” Prosciutto shouts, losing all rational thoughts to his panicked state. 

It tilts its head to the side. “I am not doing anything weird.” 

“YES YOU ARE! YOU’RE FUCKING EXISTING AND TALKING, GODDAMMIT!” He loses his balance and falls forward, and the monster scoots out of the way and watches his face collide with the floor.

“Fra! What’s with all the commotion?!” Pesci runs down the stairs in his pajamas. He gasps, seeing the monster awake and well.

“IT WAS WATCHING ME IN MY SLEEP!” Prosciutto scrambles off of the floor and yeets himself to Pesci, his big chubby meat shield. 

“I was curious if humans have dreams.” The creature responds rather calmly. 

Prosciutto spits. “Well guess what! I was dreaming about how I’m going to SMASH YOUR UGLY FACE IN!”

“...Rude.”

“Fra! Don’t be mean to our guest! He hasn’t done anything to hurt you!” Pesci scolds his older brother as he physically holds him back. 

“GUEST!? _HE!?”_

“Here, why don’t we try starting us off with a more… _friendly_ approach, Fra!” Pesci looks to the octopus-dragon-human thing, “My name is Pesci, and this is my older brother Prosciutto!” Pesci waves with a smile. Prosciutto sneers. 

“I am called Risotto Nero.” The creature says.

“It’s nice to meet you, Risotto! See, Fra? It’s not hard to be nice! Now you will be friendly with him now that you know each other’s names, yes?” He shoves Prosciutto towards Risotto. 

Prosciutto stumbles and narrows his eyes. “Since we’re so-called friends now, do me a favor and go back to whatever hellish dimension you came from.”

“That would not be optimal,” Risotto starts, “I am still healing. Furthermore, if I go back to the ocean now my wounds will surely open up, and I will become shark bait.” 

“GOOD!” 

“Fra! He will be staying here until he’s better, is that understood!?” Pesci puts his hands on his hips and musters up a determined expression to prove his point.

Realizing that his brother is physically stronger than him and he’s very much set on keeping that thing here, he sighs. “Fine. But don’t expect me to end up liking him.” 

“Why do you hate me so, human named Prosciutto?” Risotto questions.

“You’re a gross abomination from the depths of the deep blue hell!”

“FRA!”  
___________

Pesci, eventually, has to leave to go back out fishing since the seagulls stole everything he left out on the beach yesterday. He has to make a living somehow.

“Don’t kill each other, ok?”

“I have no reason to harm him, so I will not.”

“If he touches me, I’ll shoot him.”

Pesci waves goodbye, closes the front door behind him and heads out to the boat. Prosciutto stands there, feeling abandoned that he’s left alone with an indescribable horror named Risotto Nero. He cannot possibly tolerate a creature that is absolutely ruining his life in every way, shape and form. But, Pesci wants them to get along and be friendly or whatever. 

Anything to make his little brother happy, he supposes. There needs to be some rules established first. Prosciutto turns on his heel and faces the monster named Risotto.

“You. You’re leaving my house as soon as you’re healed up. _Understand?”_ He grits his teeth as he spits out those words.

“Ok.” Risotto says emotionlessly.

“And don’t touch anything!” Prosciutto scolds as if Risotto already did something wrong.

“Ok.”

“Fucking good!” Prosciutto says with sass and sits down on the couch (not the one Risotto slept on. Prosciutto could never) glaring at Risotto, who makes brief eye contact with him but looks away to mindlessly stroll around the living room.

Prosciutto thinks to himself. How do you become friends with someone, or rather something, you don’t like? Talking is always a good start, but he has a bitchy attitude. Go on a walk with them? Someone is going to see them together and call the _fucking_ cops. 

Well, that’s how you become friends with humans. Animals become your friend when you feed them. Wait, some humans work like that. What the _fuck_ does Risotto even count as? 

Prosciutto falls deep into thought, barely paying attention to the bare chested creature wandering around the living room anymore. Risotto seems to observe everything, from the couch he was laying on before to the photo frames on the wall to the little vase with fake silk flowers in them. His striped reptile tail sways from side to side fluidly and slowly, as if he’s a dog sniffing the grass. He’s not touching anything like Prosciutto told him to, at least.

The blond decides he should try giving Risotto some food. While the octofuck is distracted with the utterly fascinating living room, Prosciutto slips into the kitchen and opens the fridge. He scans the shelves for anything expired or gross that he, the fairly picky blond bitch baby, will not eat.

There’s a carton of milk, eggs, cheeses, lots of vegetables, a bowl of leftover spaghetti, bread, fish that Pesci caught, and a plastic bag full of gross clams they collected together on the beach the other day.

Prosciutto hand shoots into the fridge and pulls out the bag of clams, being reminded of the traumatizing memories of one sticking its ‘tongue’ out at him. He thinks clams taste disgusting anyway so he might as well give them to Risotto. Turning around, he—

“Çłäm.” 

_**“AAAAAAH!!”**_ Prosciutto shrieks, jumping up and reflexively throwing the bag at Risotto’s face who was apparently behind him the whole fucking time. The tentacles on his face latch onto the bag, and he… looks happy? 

Some overjoyed, yet unholy noise comes out of Risotto’s throat, and Prosciutto is nothing short of disturbed and shitting himself. He’s trapped between him and the refrigerator. 

“Thank you for the çłäms, human named Prosciutto.” His tail swishes back and forth jubilantly, and he turns on his clawed heel to eat at the dining table. Prosciutto stands there frozen, watching him casually unwrap the bag as if Prosciutto didn’t just scream in his face like a teenage girl in a horror movie.

“You… You’re welcome.” Prosciutto remains in the corner of the kitchen, as far away from him as possible. He doesn’t take his eyes off of Risotto.

Risotto pulls out a clam, inspects it, and pries it clean open with his taloned hands with no effort at all within a second, emphasized with a _crisp_ cracking sound. Prosciutto’s jaw drops to the fucking floor.

His tentacles lift all the way up, and pops the clam meat into his— _beak?_ Prosciutto was honestly expecting a horrific lamprey orifice full of teeth, but it’s a little black parrot beak. He snaps up the clam meat like an owl chowing on a mouse and it disappears down his throat. He reaches for another clam. And another. And another… 

Until there’s nothing left but the lifeless husks called shells all over the goddamn table. 43 clams, all gone. Risotto looks disappointed at the lack of live, whole clams. He checks under the plastic bag, then the table for any more. His wings and tail droop and some of the color fades in his scales.

“Ugh. My appetite got to me again.” He mumbles, and starts cleaning up his mess.

Prosciutto courageously responds to try to start a conversation with him, still horrified, “That implies that that’s happened before.” 

Risotto turns to face him. “That is how I got caught in that net in the first place.” 

“Huh?”

“There were fish strung up in it, so I took my chance to have an easy meal,” He speaks, “I did not expect the boat to start moving all of a sudden before the net was to be pulled up. The currents grew stronger with the storm and I could not escape in time. I got snagged in the process.” 

Prosciutto’s mouth falls open in a perfect ‘o’ shape, remembering who exactly decided to turn back the boat before the net could be hauled up. A bit of guilt swells in his chest and he looks off to the side. It’s his fault that he’s stuck with Risotto, now he’s facing the consequences of being a fucking idiot.

“I presume the boat was belonging to you and your brother? That is how I ended up in your home, yes?” 

“Er, yes you’re right about that…” mumbles Prosciutto. He glances back over at Risotto who is staring at him intently. Or at least, Prosciutto thinks he is. 

“I wish to thank you and your brother for taking me into your home and tending to my wounds. I am grateful, truly,” Risotto places a clawed hand over his heart —or maybe one of his three hearts— and bows, “I would have preferred to thank your brother in person as well, however he is out at the moment.” 

Prosciutto is a bit surprised at Risotto’s eloquence, especially considering that those words came from the beak of a literal monster. His expression of confusion prompts Risotto to speak up again, “It is to my understanding that you are not fond of my presence. As I will be staying here until I heal for an indefinite amount of time, I believe it is in our best interest for both of us to make an effort to get along with one another as your brother stated earlier, human named Prosciutto.” 

As much as Prosciutto hates this situation and hates him, he’s fucking right. 

Risotto continues, “I do not know how humans bond, but perhaps we could simply chat and get to know one another. That is a start,” he says tossing away the clam shells.

Prosciutto gives him a look, biting his tongue to stop him from saying anything too rude, “What the fuck do we talk about?” 

“I would assume you have many questions about me, human named Prosciutto.”

“Can… you just call me Prosciutto?” The blond says tensely.

“As you wish, Prosciutto.” Risotto leans back in the chair he’s sitting in, only to hiss when his broken wing comes in contact with the back of it. He opts to slouch forward with his legs open instead like a gangster. 

Awkward silence falls between them. Prosciutto rocks on his heels, trying his best to ignore the tension in the room and the crimson eyes peering at him while failing miserably. They just need to talk, how hard can that be? Besides, he does in fact have a lot of questions.

Giving Risotto a sour side look, “So what the hell even are you?”

“...Elaborate?” Risotto asks with a tilted head.

Prosciutto wildly gestures to all of Risotto. “What the _FUCK_ are you!? You… have tentacles on your face and you have bat wings! You are not normal!”

“I do not see how that is not normal.”

“You’re a literal amalgamation! You look like an alien!”

“An alien?” Risotto muses for a moment, “I suppose you could label me as one.”

“E-Excuse me?” Prosciutto stutters.

“My kind have colonized this planet for a millennia, longer than you humans have been here, or at least that is what The Great Old One tells us. However, we have lived long enough here to be considered native… since you humans consider modern cephalopods an Earth species which are directly descended from us… by those standards I am not an alien.” Risotto mutters in deep thought.

That answer only raises more questions in Prosciutto’s mind. Ones that he doesn’t want to be answered. _Your kind? There’s more of you shits? Octopuses are actually aliens?? Great Old One???_

“I am getting sidetracked, my apologies. To answer your question, I am R’lyehian.”

“A ree-lie— What? How do you make that noise with your mouth?” Prosciutto reacts with a face that sort of looks like you, the reader, would make when you study for a test, and nothing you studied for is on it.

“It is in my native tongue, which too is called R’lyehian.” He confirms.

With a curiosity that Prosciutto knows he will soon regret, “Can you speak some more?”

Risotto ponders, looking Prosciutto up and down then speaks.

“Y' ymg' mgah'n'ghft og c’te, shuggoth.” 

“...Are you just making gibberish up or was that real?” A frightened Prosciutto asks.

“It was real, Prosciutto.” 

“I’m not going to believe you unless you tell me what it means!”

“...I shall tell you later.”

“That’s not fair at all, you gross bastard…” Prosciutto pauses in thought, remembering the dream from that morning, “It… sounds like the demonic chanting I heard in my horrible dream last night.”

Risotto quirks an eyebrow, or at least it looks like one to Prosciutto, “Did it sound like ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn?”

“T-That’s exactly what it sounded like!”

“Oh,” Risotto sighs deeply, “Ignore that. That is The Great Old One Cthuhlu trying to start another cult.”

“...What?”

“He communicates with humans and our kind through dreams. I will talk to him about it to leave you alone. Next question, please.”

“Actually, I don’t want to know anything else about you or this fucking cult bullshit.” And Prosciutto walks the hell out of that kitchen.

_______

The two share small, meaningless interactions here and there throughout the rest of the day with Prosciutto staying as far away from Risotto as he can (meaning he’s huddled up in his room like a teenager). Later on from downstairs, he can hear Risotto rummaging around his refrigerator and the sounds of raw fish being torn apart and scarfed down. Good thing Prosciutto has plenty of blankets to feel safe and warm.

Pesci comes home that evening to change Risotto’s bandages. Prosciutto sat on the other side of the room, watching with a bit of guilt as a total of 17 gut wrenching cuts were cleaned off.

Risotto thanks Pesci in person, and the brothers head upstairs to retire for the night with Risotto remaining downstairs on the couch to rest.

“So Fra,” Pesci starts with a yawn, “How are you two getting along?”

“Uh… he ate all the clams we collected and your fish.”

Pesci grins. “I’m glad he’s eating! But that’s not what I asked, Fra.”

Prosciutto huffs. “I’m starting to tolerate him, I guess. I still think he’s hideous though.”

“Good! At least there’s progress. Now sleep a lot tonight, because I’m heading out again and you’ll have to tolerate him even more!”

“Great.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can feel HP Lovecraft rolling around in his grave. Which is good, he was HELLA racist


	3. Weird Dog

That night, no cryptic dreams with equally cryptic chanting bother Prosciutto and he sleeps peacefully. The following day Pesci leaves early in the morning to go fishing, and Prosciutto and Risotto are left alone once more. Just _great._

Prosciutto rises from bed, combing his blond locks from his face and looking around for any octo-person crouched down watching him. There is none thankfully, so he brushes out his hair and ties it into a ponytail before he makes his way downstairs to fix himself some breakfast. He walks past Risotto, who is curled up on the couch still asleep, with his wing wrapped around himself like a bat.

_Good, I can make my breakfast in peace._ Prosciutto walks into the kitchen to grab a carton of eggs, but stops when a note on the counter catches his eye. 

In messy handwriting: _Dear Fra, I know how you are so I’m going to tell you to make breakfast for our guest too! Make sure it’s nice! Love, your little brother Pesci._

“UGH!” Prosciutto groans loudly and tosses the note into the trash can. He opens the cabinet and fetches two plates, a frying pan and takes out the egg carton from the refrigerator. He flips on the stove and tosses some olive oil into the pan.

The noise summons Risotto. Clearly, he is hungry.

“What are you doing?” Risotto questions, hovering near Prosciutto like a child seeking attention.

Prosciutto jumps up at the sudden appearance of the octofuck but quickly collects himself. “I’m cooking eggs for breakfast.” 

“What animal are the eggs from?”

“Chickens.” Prosciutto says and cracks two eggs into the pan.

“Are they a kind of bird?”

“Yes.” He sprinkles some salt and pepper onto the crackling eggs.

“Why do you have to cook the eggs? Why do you not eat them the way they are?”

“You will catch salmonella if you don’t fry them.”

“I … know fish come from eggs, but I was unaware that salmon hatch from bird eggs.”

“No, salmonella is a kind of bacteria.”

“Bacteria?”

“They’re these little bugs that your eyes can’t see because they’re microscopic.”

“Oh. Interesting…” He mutters deeply, observing Prosciutto flip the sunny side up eggs onto a plate in fascination before his attention quickly shifts, “What is this wooden, rounded object on a stick?” He asks holding a wooden, rounded object on a stick.

“That’s called a spoon. You use that to eat.” Prosciutto responds sounding deadpanned and rolls his eyes, bored of the little questionnaire going on.

“To eat…?” Risotto tilts his head.

“Well, humans don’t like getting their hands dirty eating and sometimes we eat soup— STOP CHEWING ON MY _FUCKING SPOON!”_ Prosciutto’s arm shoots up and yanks the spoon from his beak, brushing up against those writhing tentacles and their suckers. He reflexively whips his hand away believing he’s come in contact with repulsive slime, shrieking and runs to wipe his hand off on a towel only to realize there is no goddamn slime. The fuck? 

“What is the matter, Prosciutto?” Risotto asks cluelessly. 

“I thought you got all your gunky tentacle slime on my hand!” He bitchily cries while wiping his hand obsessively.

“I do not… have mucus on any part of my body asides from the inside of my throat.” The R’lyehian says with an almost hurt tone.

“But you look all slippery and shit!”

“I like to keep my scales polished so that they look shiny and appealing. They do not feel slimy at all.”

“So you’re… _not_ cold and dripping with mucus.” Prosciutto confirms.

“Have I left any mucus trails in your home like a slug?” Risotto answers with a question.

“No?”

“Exactly. Now, I know you do not like statements without proof.” Risotto says and he rolls up his sleeve, extending his arm out to Prosciutto. His big, muscular scaly clawed arm. Prosciutto stands there like an idiot, clueless.

“...Touch me.” He commands.

“ _Please_ don’t say it like that.”

“I do not see the problem in saying ‘touch me’.”

“Just— Whatever! Never mind.” Prosciutto reluctantly reaches out with a finger at his arm and he hesitantly pokes Risotto’s bicep. It’s firm with toned muscle. 

Risotto keeps his arm out. “See? I am not slimy.”

“Okay…” Still not convinced (and also wanting feel that _sweet_ muscle further), Prosciutto lowers his entire hand onto his bicep and lets it glide down a sheet of smooth, dry and pearly snake scales. His mouth falls open and he continues to caress Risotto’s arm in mesmerization at the feeling of the not-so-gross scales beneath his fingertips. Maybe… they’re a little pretty, Prosciutto supposes. The iridescence with the sunlight from the window hitting them is quite beautiful to gaze upon.

“Gorgeous…” Prosciutto mutters and he places both hands on his arm.

“Ahem.” Risotto too, is gazing down upon him. If you can even call it gazing, it’s more like a stoic stare. Prosciutto’s eyes snap up at him back to reality.

“Fuck,” he snatches his hand away and wipes it off on the nearest towel, “I didn’t mean to fucking pet you.”

“You seemed to be enjoying yourself, Prosciutto. Do you like my arm that much?” Risotto says with a cocky tone. Prosciutto swears he sees a smile under that beard of tentacles.

“Shut the fuck up and eat your food!” He yells with a flushed face and shoves a plate of eggs to Risotto. 

“Your face is red. Are you ok?”

“Just eat, you octofuck!”

__________

“Your cooking is very impressive, Prosciutto. Thank you for the meal.” Risotto remarks after eating his breakfast within seconds. He looks up at Prosciutto who’s sitting on the other end of the table, who just witnessed Risotto eat not with the silverware provided, but with nothing but his tentacles. 

“Thanks And you’re welcome…” Prosciutto responds mildly disturbed. He picks up his fork and knife and starts eating like a civilized human being. After a few tasty bites of home cooked egg, he peeks up at Risotto observing him like a hawk. “Why are you staring at me like that?”

“I am observing how humans use their tools to eat.”

Prosciutto pauses for a moment with a terrible idea. He lifts up the fork and sees Risotto’s pupils follow upwards with it. Then he lowers it. His pupils lower. He makes a circling gesture with it, and chuckles when Risotto’s eyes make a full circle staying fixated on it like a cat eyeing the elusive red glowing dot.

“...Are you attempting to cast a spell with that eating tool, Prosciutto?” inquires a very perplexed Risotto.

“No, but you look like a stupid idiot.” Prosciutto scoffs followed by a soft snicker.

“I am not an idiot…”

_________

Risotto keeps his distance from Prosciutto for the rest of the day instead of hovering around observing him. Prosciutto forgets about him for a while, going about his chores and house cleaning as per usual. He’s left alone in his thoughts mindlessly sweeping at the floor. 

_Hey Prosciutto_ , his subconscious says, _don’t be calling him an idiot because he’s shown clear intelligence with his curiosity and awareness of his surroundings._ Shut up, voice of logical reasoning. _He probably has feelings too and you hurt them._ Octopuses don’t HAVE feelings. Or aliens. Whatever. _Pesci would be mad if he came home and found Risotto crying because of you._ Valid point.

Maybe Risotto is crying in some dark, damp corner of the house, weeping that some inferior mortal _dared_ to insult him and his hideousness. That gets a chuckle out of Prosciutto, but he realizes he should really try to be nice to him lest he press the wrong button and end up a bloodied smear of a meal. Prosciutto thinks he hears something like water, perhaps it’s Risotto crying but it’s very akin to running bath water— 

_Oh HELL no._

He drops the broom and races up the stairs, taking a sharp right turn to the open bathroom.

“I did not know humans are capable of utilizing running water, and warm water at that.” Risotto, who’s squatting in the bathtub fully clothed, chirps happily.

“Hey! Get out of my goddamned bathtub!” Prosciutto chides.

Risotto gives him a rebellious look. “No.” He narrows his eyes.

“Excuse me?! I told you _not_ to touch anything!” Scolds Prosciutto like a soccer mom.

“I am not leaving this miniature pond. Have you forgotten that I am from the ocean?”

“I haven’t forgotten but that doesn’t change the fact that you need to get out— HEY JACKASS STOP IT!” Prosciutto screeches and tries blocking the water launched at him from Risotto’s thrashing dragon tail.

_“My water.”_ He hisses territorially like a rattlesnake and his good wing flares a little in a threat posture.

Prosciutto sets his jaw. “That is _not_ your fucking water! There are water bills that _I_ and _Pesci_ have to pay for!” 

“Y...You humans have to pay for water...of all things…?” Risotto asks, frightened.

“Every fucking month!”

“I genuinely pity your kind for paying for a resource as common as water. However… I am still not leaving this miniature pond. It is very nice and I like it.”

Prosciutto annoyedly sighs, “Just turn off the fucking water when the tub is filled,” and sits on the bathroom counter to keep an eye on him.

Risotto turns off the tap as the water just barely starts overflowing from the tub and drips to the tile floor, making Prosciutto’s eye twitch in irritation. Risotto settles down in the water in a state of utter bliss, making an expression something like the cursed _UwU_ face. He lays on his side, curling up and completely (somehow) submerging himself in the warm bath water, his chest rising and falling as he breathes it in. More water spills out of the tub.

A groan comes out of Prosciutto mouth and he’s immediately patting up the spill with a towel.

Risotto’s head bobs up from the tub. “Prosciutto. Water evaporates into the air. There is no need to do that.”

“I don’t care, you’re making a huge mess!”

“Water is hardly a mess and you are being highly irrational.” Risotto peers over the edge of the tub. His suckers make audible popping sounds when his tentacles cling to the outside.

“I’m not being irrational!” Prosciutto argues and he dries up the puddle.

“What if I spilled more water?” Risotto says, and spits water in an arch over Prosciutto’s head. 

“ACK! Stop getting water everywhere you ass!” Prosciutto grabs another towel to stop the forming puddle behind him, and pats it away in a frantic manner. Risotto chuckles deeply in amusement, and Prosciutto’s head snaps back at him, “I _was_ going to apologize for calling you an idiot earlier, but now you’re really starting to be a little shit and get on my nerves,” he grumbles, glaring at the red eyes that stare at him right back.

“I was terribly offended that you called me one, but not anymore because now I realize that I am not in fact the idiot here.”

“So you’re calling me the idiot now—“ His sentence stops when Risotto spits more water and he’s at another puddle again with the towel. 

“See? You are an irrational idiot.” Risotto bellows with laughter.

“Stop it!”

“Prosciutto, I am only teasing you. Silly human.”

“I’m not a ‘silly human.’ Fuck you.” Prosciutto rolls his eyes and flicks Risotto square between the eyes on his forehead. Risotto flinches and an inhuman noise comes out of his throat.

A little itsy bitsy squeak, you could call it.

Prosciutto gasps and his eyes widen in utter disbelief. So he flicks him again. 

_“Eep!”_

“Oh my God, that’s the cutest thing I’ve heard in my entire life.” Prosciutto giggles. Wait, what did Hell did he just say?

Risotto hisses. “Prosciutto, I will call upon the power of the mighty Azathoth to smite yo— _EEP!_ Please stop me hitting me.”

“I’m barely even hitting you, you’re being irrational!” Flick. “And!” Flick. “This is revenge for getting water all over the place!” Flick.

Risotto squeaks for the last time. He throws his good wing over defensively himself and dunks into the water to effectively avoid Prosciutto’s wrathful finger, splashing water all over the blond and his bathroom, making him shriek. He’s absolutely soaking wet to the brim and bone.

Risotto’s octopus head rises and peeks from the water. “That was an accident. I did it out of defensive instinct I swear it. Are you ok? Prosciutto?”

Prosciutto looks up, ready to absolutely scream at him. However it seems that Risotto, just like Pesci, is a master of the cruel art known as the puppy eyes. His once thin pupils are now fully blown circles giving him the perfected look of a guilty puppy. Prosciutto’s angry expression drops almost instantly.

“I am sorry, Prosciutto.” Risotto apologizes meekly. His tentacles tuck together in a polite manner and he shrinks back expecting to be yelled at. You know, like a puppy except this particular puppy is a giant octopus monster.

Screaming at him would be the morally incorrect thing to do and God would frown upon him.

“You know what… it’s fine.” Not looking at Risotto to hide his flustered face, he grabs a towel to wrap himself up in and quickly shuffles out of the bathroom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m sorry to everyone reading this.
> 
> Disclaimer: Please do not flick an octopus between the eyes. They can’t squeak.


	4. Weird Human

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hm, yea more weird shenanigans

A fresh change of clothes and a nap later, a clean and dry Prosciutto comes out of his bedroom. He takes a turn to the bathroom to see if Risotto is still in the tub, but alas! Nothing but a perfectly clean bathroom without a splotch of water and hung towels on the walls. Risotto must have cleaned up after himself. 

He makes his way down the stairs, seeing the evening’s warm rays shift through the curtains in the living room. _That must have been a fat ass nap._

“Good evening, Fra!” Pesci pipes up. He’s in the kitchen making their dinner. 

“Good evening Pesci,” Prosciutto greets his little brother with a hug and a good ol’ caress on his rubber head, “How was fishing?”

“It was great! I caught a lot of fish and sold most of them!” He smiles, “And today’s your lucky day! I caught your favorite, Fra!”

“You got flounder!?” Prosciutto excitedly exclaims, getting even more excited when Pesci nods and he looks over his shoulder at the beautiful fish crackling in the pan.

“Mhm! I’m frying it the way you like it.” He smiles and Prosciutto is moved to tears. 

“Pesci, I love you so much and absolutely _nothing_ can change that—“

“So how are you and Risotto doing, Fra? Are you getting along well?”

“And like that, you’ve ruined the conversation.” Prosciutto slow claps.

“Cmon Fra, he can’t be _that_ bad!”

“He— ugh! He’s alright I guess. And maybe he’s a little cute sometimes.” Prosciutto crosses his arms and huffs.

“That’s great, Fra!” Pesci smiles and serves a plate of flounder to his older brother, “Now eat up!”

“Thank you.” Prosciutto turns on his heel and sits down to eat. He picks up a fork and knife, and takes a bite of the wondrously flaky flesh of the flounder. Honest to God he _moans_ at its flavor. The warmth of the spices combined with the fresh tender herbs sprinkled throughout it, the crisp skin of the fish and its soft meat that melts in his mouth, the subtle garlic and butter, finishing its off its palette with all of that _love_ Pesci poured into it for his brother. Oh, and the sauce is killer.

“Do you like it, Fra?” Pesci asks as Prosciutto literally sobs over his brother’s home cooked food. 

“Oh my God Pesci, it tastes as good as it looks and smells,” he pats his tears away with a napkin, “I feel like I’ve gone to heaven and back!” 

Prosciutto stuffs his mouth, bite after bite he devours the but pauses halfway through the fillet. “Where’s the octofuck, anyway?” He turns his head, expecting a weird and hungry goth octopus behind him watching him eat. 

“Oh! He went outside to the beach.”

“Outside where people can SEE HIM!?” He drops the fork and knife and gets up from his seat, “WHAT IF SOMEONE TRIES TO KILL HIM!?”

“Aaaaww, you _do_ care about him after all, Fra!”

“No I fucking don’t!” The blond retorts assertively.

“Yes you do! Anyway, he told me he can turn invisible and camouflage if someone is close by! That’s why I let him out.”

“Turn invisible!?— so THAT’S how he’s been sneaking up on my ass this entire time! Ugh!” Prosciutto throws his arms in the air and sits back down, “So what was his reason for going outside?”

Pesci shrugs. “He only told me he wanted to go out.”

“Thanks for the fairly useless information,” Prosciutto pinches the bridge of his nose, inhales deeply and exhales slowly. Suddenly, the doorknob to the front door jostles and in steps a Risotto Nero. Prosciutto jumps up from his seat again, “Jesus Christ, there you are!”

“My name is... not Jesus Christ.” Risotto takes literally.

“It’s a figure of speech!” 

“You humans are so strange with your language. In any case…” Risotto reaches into his coat pocket with his clawed hands and pulls something out, “I got this for you, Prosciutto.”

“For me?” The blond questions, and Risotto holds out a beautiful shell, lined with gorgeous mother of pearl. (Pesci in the background squeals with joy.)

“It is an abalone shell. I thought you would like it, and hopefully accept it as an apology for getting you wet. I was unsure if you were still upset with me because I could not see your face,” his tail sways low to the floor, “I took the liberty of taking out the abalone itself as well. I ate it. I hope you do not mind.”

Prosciutto is speechless. Risotto didn’t _have_ to go out of his way like this to apologize, but he’s flattered nonetheless. He takes the shell from his scaly hands and looks up at the rather unsettling (but kind and sweet at the same time) eyes gazing down at him. 

“Thank you. It’s absolutely stunning! And I, uh, wasn’t really upset at you after you apologized earlier.” Prosciutto laughs sheepishly.

“Oh! I was very worried that you were.” Risotto seems relieved and much happier than he was before.

“Well, really I should be the one apologizing. I kept flicking you in the face and that’s why you splashed me in the first place. So, sorry… Risotto.” Prosciutto looks down at the abalone as he mutters his name for the first time. Something in Risotto’s eyes seems to light up at his name and a happy noise squeaks out of his throat. 

“I forgive you, Prosciutto.” He crouches down a little to the blond’s eye level. In a split second, one of his tentacles reach from his face and presses a sucker to his cheek making a little ‘smoochie’ sound.

(Pesci squeals even louder in the background and jumps with joy).

“I— Did you just give me a kiss—“ Prosciutto’s head snaps up and he stutters with a red face.

“You should go to bed. It is almost night time.” 

“Wait, please answer me—“

“Goodnight, Prosciutto. Sleep well.” Risotto turns on his clawed heel and walks away to the living room where he sleeps. 

The flabbergasted man turns to his little brother. “Did you just see that?!”

“He likes you, Fra!” Pesci giggles.

“You know what, I’m fucking going to bed too. You can have the rest of the flounder.” He drags himself up the stairs to his bedroom. 

____________

He can’t sleep. One, because he took a nap earlier. Two, he basically got a kiss from a 6’7” octopus monster. Prosciutto lays there on his bed having a crisis. Any stereotypical Catholic man would have a crisis after that.

 _Honestly_ , he thinks to himself, _Risotto isn’t even that bad. He’s pretty sweet for something that looks like it came from Satan’s flaming sin asshole. Also he has some nice biceps. Mmm..._

He sits up and glances at the abalone shell Risotto gifted to him earlier. He put it on his nightstand with the inside facing up with all the dazzling colors. _Looks like his pearly scales in the sunlight…_

Prosciutto decides to get himself a glass of water because that’s what you do when you can’t sleep and you’re having a crisis. He tip-toes down the stairs, careful not to wake Pesci upstairs or Risotto on the couch.

Again, Risotto has the audacity to be snoring in his house. He’s curled up and wrapped up in his wings, hugging his long tail as he’s sleeping. Prosciutto gets his glass of water, stopping when he’s about to sneak back upstairs to look down at Risotto. 

He’s shivering a little. 

Prosciutto presses his lips together in a straight line and heads back upstairs.

_________

Risotto stretches, yawning with the earliest morning rays waking him up. He blinks awake to find the softest material he’s ever felt on his scales. There’s a big ol’ quilted blanket on top of him. It’s very warm, like the human’s cheek. Now when did that get there? 

He examines it closely, holding it up and his tentacles poking at it. He finds a blond strand of hair on it, and to that discovery he curls back in and snuggles into the blanket happily.

“...Maybe I should give this back to the human. He must be cold too.” He takes the blanket into his arms and shuffles upstairs with it. With his arms full of soft goodness, he uses his tentacles to turn the doorknob to Prosciutto’s room and he slips in. 

The blond is a complete mess on the bed. His limbs are sprawled across the blanket-less sheets and his hair isn’t any better. Nonetheless, he is beautiful. Risotto has always thought Prosciutto’s pretty. He’s fond of him, really. 

The R’lyehian silently approaches the bed and lays the blanket over the sleeping Prosciutto. He smiles under his beard of tentacles when Prosciutto moves in his sleep to take the blanket in his arms and rolls onto his side.

But now Risotto doesn’t have a soft blanket anymore. However, his highly intelligent octobrain has evolved for the purpose of solving practical problems such as these. 

____________

“Ugh…” Prosciutto grumbles. He’s half awake, and the warmth of the bed seriously isn’t helping with that. He faintly registers his blanket back on him, which he swears he gave to Risotto last night. So what’s it doing back on his bed?

Speaking of the blanket, it feels heavier than normal. Specifically around his waist. It feels like he’s being hugged by Pesci from behind.

Something’s on his face and shoulders too. There’s a scaly tail wrapped around his legs. Something’s also snoring behind him. His face turns red for probably the millionth time this week.

To confirm his suspicions, Prosciutto reaches up to the tentacle on his cheek and squishes it between his fingers.

Risotto squeaks and jolts awake. He immediately realizes what he’s doing and haphazardly leaps off of Prosciutto and the bed. “Please forgive me Prosciutto, I did not want to give up the blanket but I did not want you to be cold so I decided to share with you, I did not mean to invade your personal space—“

“It’s fucking fine!” He throws the blanket over himself.

“But your face is red again. Does that not mean you are upset?”

“I’m not! I’m just… flustered. I’m blushing.”

“Blushing? Is it that natural phenomenon when humans turn red when they are in love?”

“N-Not always!” 

“Oh…” Risotto says dejectedly. 

Not wanting to hurt his feelings, “I-I mean, I don’t hate you Risotto!”

“You do not hate me?” His tail starts violently wagging. 

“I… Goddammit, I don’t even fucking know at this point.” Prosciutto runs a tired hand through his hair and rubs his temples.

Risotto gives him a questioning look. “How do you not know how you feel about another individual?” 

“I don’t know! Whatever. I’m going to go back to sleep.”

“But Prosciutto, the sun is already up.”

“Goodnight!” 

“Humans are the strangest creatures to exist…” Risotto steps out of Prosciutto’s room and closes the door. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At this point I can’t even tell if this is a crack fic anymore.


	5. Divine Eldritch Intervention

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The character you’ve all been waiting for is here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m expecting HP Lovecraft’s ghost at my door tonight with a knife, some gasoline and a blowtorch. If he can muster up the courage to do that, that is.

_Risotto finds himself floating in a deep abyss, and a familiar one at that. The glowing sigils, the strange architecture of the underwater city… yes, this is home. R’lyeh. He has a feeling why he’s here. With a powerful snap of his tail, he’s diving deep towards the grand doors of the home to none other than the High Priest of the Great Old Ones._

_A few simple taps of his clawed finger and the giant ornate doors shakily creak open to invite him in. Respectfully, he keeps his head bowed as he swims in and lands his feet on the old stone floor, long worn from the currents after more than a millennia._

_The doors creak shut behind him with an echoing thud. Risotto steps forward into a large open chamber shrouded in murky darkness, the one belonging to the Great Old One, Cthulhu._

_Glowing blood red eyes that match his own look down upon him. Faint figures of a mass of tentacles on the face of a vaguely anthropoid monster, narrow wings and a body covered in greenish reptilian scales._

_“Greetings, O Great Old One.” Risotto kneels down before him, waiting for permission to speak._

(For your convenience, the author has graciously translated this R’lyehian conversation into the language of English, to make it more comprehensible to mortals.) 

_“...There is no need to call me that. Stand.” A gargantuan, taloned finger reaches out from the darkness in an upward motion. Obviously, it belongs to motherfucking Cthulhu._

_Risotto sighs and stands up. “Yes, great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather Cthulhu.”_

_“There we are. Now. Risotto, do you know why you are here?” Cthulhu bellows._

_“I mean no disrespect grandfather, but if you are about to tell me that my fondness for Prosciutto is forbidden because he is a mortal and I am the spawn of you, The Great Old One, I do not want to hear it.”_

_“Oh, no no. Far from that, in fact.”_

_“Is it because we are both males? I understand that two individuals with penises are not the most compatible in copulation but—“_

_“That is not why you are here, grandson.” Cthulhu interrupts._

_“Then why are you speaking with me through this dream?” He earnestly looks up at Cthulhu seeking an answer._

_The great eldritch beast inhales. “First of all, you are moving too quickly on the human.”_

_Shocked that the High Priest isn’t upset with him, “What do you mean?”_

_“You have only known the human for a few days and you have already given him a sucker kiss.”_

_“I… do not see the problem in displaying my affection for him. I like him.”_

_“That is the problem, Risotto. Humans are much like the little shrimp the anglerfish here catch and eat.”_

_“How so?” A perplexed Risotto asks._

_“The anglerfish lures in shrimp with minuscule movements and sways to not scare it. They know the shrimp is afraid of sudden movements. Humans are no different with courtship. You must act slow on them,” a long tentacles moves from the darkness in a languid motion, “Lure them in with grace and fluidity like one of their waltz dances, not jolts and spazzes. They are very delicate creatures after all.”_

_“Oh…”_

_“Because you kissed him, the human is somewhat overwhelmed and having a crisis. Presenting the shell as a gift was smart of you, however. Letting him touch your scales also built trust between him and you, showing that you will not harm him is very good.”_

_“Thank you, grandfather.”_

_“Now… as to improve your current route of courting the human, refrain from physical touch more because you two are not at that level yet, but let your feelings for him be known more subtly. Though, I doubt that the human doesn’t know that you have at least some fondness for him.”_

_“How do I do that?”_

_“The human finds your puppy eyes, squeaks and tail wagging adorable. Keep that up grandson. Start complimenting him more too, he seems to like that sort of attention.”_

_“I see. I shall note that. Oh, I have a question, grandfather.”_

_“Yes?”_

_“Why does Prosciutto blush?”_

_“The human is conflicted. He finds you… attractive. He likes your impressive musculature is what I am saying. However, he does not know how to feel about the fact that you are the human’s definition of a monster. If he can push that negative attitude aside, I am certain he is yours.”_

_Risotto nods, subconsciously holding one of the tentacles on his face between his talons._

_“I know you can do it, grandson.” Faintly in the darkness past that beard of writhing tentacles, The Great Old One gives him a smile. A tentacle stretches out and very (VERY) gently pats Risotto on the head._

_Risotto squeaks happily. “Thank you, grandfather.”_

_“...One more thing before you wake up, grandson. Your outfit is atrocious.”_

_Risotto gasps in offense. “I am an edgy teenager, let me do what I wish, grandfather!”_

_“You are 28 years old! An adult R’lyehian! Present yourself more… what is the word. Not whorish? Take that rubbish off and put something else on, your nipples and piercings are showing.”_

_“Well, because you stated that I am an adult I can do whatever the R’lyeh I want!”_

_Through the darkness, Risotto can see the The Great Old One facepalm in despair of his spawn. Where did the mighty Cthulhu go wrong? “Risotto Nero, why are you like this?”_

_“I like males. I really like males.”_

_“That is not a valid excuse to dress up like some sort of… goth BDSM clown!”_

_“Let me express my kinks! Besides! This is the highest tier fashion of R’lyeh!” Risotto sasses back to the being that can easily obliterate him in milliseconds._

_**“EVERYONE HERE EXCEPT YOU DOES NOT WEAR CLOTHES!”** _

_“EXACTLY. THERE IS NO STANDARD TO COMPARE ME TO. AT LEAST I COVER MY GENITALIA!”_

_“SIIIIIIIIIIIIGH. Are we done with this conversation, Risotto?”_

_“I love you, grandfather Cthulhu.”_

_“...I love you too. Now get the fuck out there and court some lowly mortals.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Risotto does in fact, have terrible fashion no matter what AU he’s in.
> 
> Here’s a fun thing to do! Read Cthulhu’s dialogue in Alucard’s voice from Hellsing Ultimate Abridged.


	6. Risotto Nero Tries His Best

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He really does.

Risotto stirs awake on the couch from his dream with The Great Old One. He had taken a nice, long nap after Prosciutto holed himself up in his bedroom. Again. He is a strange human, but the human species as a whole is rather strange. They do not have tentacles on their face, nor do they have scales on their bodies, _nor_ do they have a tail to swim or wings to fly.

The human household is very quiet, he observes to himself. Prosciutto’s younger brother must have left for fishing before he woke up. He wants to bother Prosciutto so badly —because it is in fact funny to Risotto how he reacts to him and his shenanigans, despite his generally stoic expression on the outside— but he should give him some space for a while. Humans are very delicate creatures after all.

As a being with a relatively high IQ (this does not equate to common sense, unfortunately) he finds himself bored easily. And he is getting bored. However when they first met, Prosciutto _specifically_ stated to not touch anything.

He does not want to disobey his pretty face and voice, but he is not going to sit around on his tail all day and do absolutely-positively-fucking-nothing either. Besides. Prosciutto is not watching. It is not illegal if the human does not know. He is sure their government works the same way. 

Risotto elegantly rolls off of the couch in a tumble, careful not to land on his still injured wing and stands up. What to do in the _Homo sapien_ den? 

The extent of what they call the ‘living room’ has already been explored (why is it called a living room when the humans live in the house in its entirety? Again, they are very strange creatures with their language) on the first day he woke up here. 

He wanders into the human kitchen, where they prepare and eat their meals. There is the contraption called the refrigerator where they keep perishable items cool and the stove oven that is used to heat food with its flames (fascinating how they learned to create cold and warmth with their technology). There are many wooden cabinets, containing plates they put their food on and assorted silverware to eat their food with.

Seriously, why can they not simply use their hands to eat? They evolved hands _with_ opposable thumbs and fingers to grasp things such a fruit and grain, but they have to over complicate eating by adding tools to the equation. Prosciutto said it is because they do not like getting their hands dirty, but do they not wash their hands anyway? That does not make sense to Risotto Nero. Perhaps humans could evolve tentacles with suckers on their faces to pull food into their mouths more easily if they want to be so picky about it.

The thought of food awakens Risotto’s endless pit of a stomach. Immediately, the refrigerator doors are swung open.

May The Great Old Ones bless the younger brother Pesci for his prowess in fishing. The refrigerator contains fresh fish! 

**[This scene has been redacted because you probably do not want a paragraph of Risotto Nero with tentacles on his face consuming fish without scaling or gutting them. Let’s just say there is no mess leftover because he eats every bit including the guts and bone.]**

Risotto finishes off the fish with a snap and it’s gone down his throat. He snatches another unfortunate fish to consume, but hesitates to eat it. Maybe Prosciutto will be hungry too when he wakes up. He recalls a proverb regarding humans: _The way to the human’s heart is through their stomach._ He is unaware that their circulatory system is connected to their digestive tract like that, but again, humans are strange. There is still much he doesn’t know about them.

What did Prosciutto say? They cook the chicken eggs so they do not catch salmonella, so fish should be no different. He remembers that he used a flat slab of iron to cook the chicken eggs with, and poured an oily substance on it before cracking the chicken eggs into the slab.

Risotto looks around. The human kitchen walls are lined with wooden cabinets. A lot. Where in the name of Yog-Sothoth does Prosciutto put his iron slabs? He has no choice but to search them all.

“This cabinet. No, THAT cabinet. There’s more plates in that one. What about this one? Cups. Hopefully this one will have the iron slabs— no, those are plates but taller and rounder. This is frustrating. Humans probably do not need this much just to consume food.” Risotto grumbles to himself, finding more and more useless kitchenware that are very tempting to knock down and break.

…

Risotto chances having Prosciutto wake up and flicks a ceramic bowl from its place. _Crack!_ It satisfyingly shatters into a million jagged pieces all over the goddamn floor.

Oops.

Risotto decides he will clean up the mess before Prosciutto wakes up. 

He eventually finds the iron slabs inside of the fucking oven. How _convenient._ If you have run out of room to put your iron slabs in the cabinets, then why do you not get _rid_ of the kitchenware that clearly has not been touched in months that is wasting valuable space…? 

Humans make no fucking sense.

He picks one up by the handle and places it on the stovetop. _Clink._

Ok. That’s step one. What about two through ten? 

Step two is probably to turn the knob on the stove. He does so and the fire flickers alive beneath the iron slab. Interesting. 

Step three is to pour some oil into the slab. He does so. Risotto is not sure how much he’s supposed to add so he pours enough to cover that slab’s entire bottom without spreading the oil.

He does not know how expensive olive oil is. Let him be blissfully unaware of his unforgivable crimes. 

Risotto takes a beautiful looking whiting fish from the fridge. It is not the most fancy tasting fish, but it will do. 

He is pretty sure humans lack the beak and beak strength to crunch up the bones. Lifting a claw, he carefully slices out the fish’s fillet free of the bone and skin. That is step four, he thinks to himself.

Did Prosciutto add salt to his chicken eggs? Ok. He will add salt to the fish too. Maybe some of the other seasonings by the salt on the shelf as well. 

Some salt, some black pepper, some red spices Risotto doesn’t know the name of are rubbed onto the fish. This is step five, though he’s sure it’s optional. The R’lyehian hasn’t the faintest clue on what they taste like on the whiting’s meat, but the seasoned fillet is aesthetically pleasing to look at with the little freckles of white, black and red.

Kind of like Prosciutto’s pretty face. Except when looking at his face, his stomach doesn’t rumble, rather his (one) heart starts to beat faster. Of the whole wide world, of the grand ocean, the billions of intelligent sentient creatures, the many boats they create, Risotto just had to land in the net of the boat that took him to what he believes is the most attractive male in existence.

He places the fillet on the iron slab, and oil crackles everywhere. Risotto Nero has nothing covering his chest or bare nipples besides the harness lookin’ straps on his jacket.

 ** _”SCREeeEeCH”_** The oil flies everywhere and stabs him with burning pain. He leaps back and knocks a chair over with his tail. It makes a resounding ‘THUD’ against the kitchen tile. Risotto hopes to his great grandfather that didn’t disturb Prosciutto. He places the chair back in its original position by the dining table. Good, good.

He’s unsure of what to do now besides wait, so he takes a seat far away from the hot oil and gnaws on the fish’s leftover skeleton with his tentacles moving it around his beak. 

Risotto’s little eldritch octobrain falls into deep thought staring at the crackling whiting fillet. 

_Why a human? There are plenty of R’lyehians in the sea. Plus, there is more ocean than there is land. Does Prosciutto even like him the same way? Sure, he said he doesn’t hate him and all, but great grandfather said he is conflicted about his feelings. Am I being too whimsical? What if he ends up not liking me at all?_

He flips the fish after a few minutes of frying, fearing the hot oil’s wrath. The cooked side is a golden brown. 

_I really hope Prosciutto likes the fish. It is very hard to cook human food._

_______

Prosciutto looks at his alarm clock. It’s telling him it’s one in the afternoon. Clearly, it’s too fucking early to wake up. Or maybe he’s just feeling lazy today. The blankets _are_ very comfortable and warm. In any case, he can’t ignore the smell of delicious cooking fish wafting through the house. 

...Doesn’t Pesci leave every morning to go fishing?

Prosciutto slips on a robe and goes downstairs to the kitchen. Turning the corner, he sees Risotto, a frying fillet _drenched_ in olive oil, and a broken bowl’s shattered pieces all over the goddamn floor.

“Oh no. I did not expect you to wake up this early.” Risotto jumps up a little in surprise and scoots between Prosciutto’s line of sight and the broken kitchenware mess.

“What the fuck did you do?” 

“Nothing.” Risotto’s tail curls around the shards trying to hide the mess.

“I can see the broken bowl.” Prosciutto states as a matter-of-factly.

“No you cannot. There is no broken bowl here. Just my tail.” The guilty puppy defends.

“Risotto, please. I need to clean it up before someone steps on it.”

“There is no mess to clean up.” He stubbornly denies.

Prosciutto sighs. “I’m not mad at you, Risotto. It’s ok.”

“Oh. Sorry. I will clean it up for you.”

“Um, no? I got it, don’t worry about it.” Prosciutto insists.

“Look! I cooked you some fish. Go eat the fish, Prosciutto.” Risotto points to the stovetop in an attempt to distract him. 

“Wait, _you_ cooked that?” Prosciutto turns his head to the stovetop, and right when he looks back at Risotto the broken bowl’s shards are in the trash can. His expression is priceless.

_This little shit._

Risotto chuckles, but Prosciutto brushes it off. Risotto has this deep, rumbling laugh that is warms his heart to listen to. Like rich hot chocolate with whipped cream? Prosciutto is terrible with similes (So is LordMarble).

“Yes, I cooked it for you. I thought you would be hungry when you woke up.”

“Did… Pesci teach you before he went out?”

“No. I figured it out by watching you cook chicken eggs.”

This thoroughly impresses the blond and touches his stone cold bitch heart (or at least, he _likes_ to think of himself as a stone cold bitch), and simultaneously terrifies him to the core. Risotto is a _Jurassic Park_ velociraptor opening doors and Prosciutto is the human who is about to get mauled to death.

Well, Risotto probably wouldn’t hurt him. He’s too sweet, too squishy for this world. And he likes him. 

“Thank you, Risotto.” Prosciutto flashes a genuine but rare smile. Risotto seems to smile back, but of course, Prosciutto can never tell what he’s thinking. He slides the fish onto a plate and sits down. It smells great, for one. Looks well seasoned. He slices into it, and it’s cooked perfectly.

Risotto watches anxiously as Prosciutto takes the first bite. His tail wags seeing his pretty face light up.

“Do you like it?” Risotto asks.

“For your first time cooking this is delicious, Risotto. Maybe… tone down with how much oil you used.” He looks up at Risotto, whose face is full of joy and his chest (his big, bara muscle tiddies) is swelled with pride.

“I am overjoyed for your mostly positive feedback as well as the fact that you like it, Prosciutto.” 

“Risotto. How about I teach you how to properly cook? I have nothing to do all day. And… maybe I’ll teach you how to cook more than just fish.”

“You can teach me so I can make more food for you?” Risotto asks excitedly.

“Hey, watch the tail wagging or you’re gonna knock something over!”

“My apologies! It is involuntary,” He turns around and grabs ahold of his long scaly dragon tail, “It wags like a canine’s when I am happy.”

___________

Pesci makes his way up to his house. It’s been a long day, boating and catching fish and selling them, but it’s a life that Pesci would never exchange for another. It’s perfect, being out in the Mediterranean Sea in the sunshine and rocking in her waves every day… it’s peaceful. Pesci likes peace and quiet.

He just wishes his Fra thought of her the same way. But Fra and the ocean are just not compatible like that, they’re like olive oil and seawater. At least he likes seafood, though! Well, that’s all they ever eat besides pasta and bread. 

The little brother gets to the front door with a basket of the catch-of-the-day. He hears some ruckus and yelling going on inside. Oh dear, what’s going on today!? Holding the basket with one arm, he opens the door with his free hand expecting chaos.

“Risotto be careful— nooo, your tore the dough! You _can’t_ put a broken ravioli in the pot, it’ll explode!”

“It will explode violently with fire everywhere? Flour, eggs, and seasoned cheese can do that in boiling water?”

“I mean— ugh! The ricotta filling will spill out into the water!”

“Ah. I see.” 

“Now watch again, Risotto! Slice along the dough carefully with the knife like this…” 

Pesci steps into the kitchen. There’s flour dust on both Prosciutto and Risotto’s clothes, sauce staining every wall, bits and pieces of just about everything in their fridge and pantry are all over the place. Prosciutto is wearing a simple white apron, and Risotto… is using their spare apron, which is a pink frilly one that says _Kiss the Cook._

He was right to be expecting chaos. 

“Fra? What the heck is going on!?” The little brother exclaims. 

His Fra’s head snaps to him. “Pesci, just in time! Can you make sure the water isn’t boiling over the pot!? It’s taking longer to show him how to make pasta than I expected!”

“I have nothing to do with… this! What even happened!?” His arms flail wildly at the mess that is the kitchen. 

“Well first we made frittatas, then we made parmigiana, THEN pesto with scallops, and now ravioli!” Prosciutto explains, “We didn’t fucking bother cleaning up in between. The pesto’s in the fridge if you want any.” 

“Is it good?” Pesci asks.

“Risotto here made it with tender love and care, so yes. It’s very good. But check that water first, Pesci!”

“Yes, I made it with lots of tender love and care.” Risotto is unsure of how you can cook with tender love. Is love an edible thing?


	7. A Sucker for Knowledge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (As well as a sucker for cute blond Italian twinks)

After what seems like a painful eternity, the mess that was the kitchen is sparkling clean thanks to the efforts of Risotto, Prosciutto and Pesci. Night has fallen on the household. Prosciutto, exhausted from scrubbing and sweeping, passed out as soon as his head touched the pillows of his bed. Risotto and Pesci remain awake, because they don’t push themselves that hard to physical deprivation like that. Especially from cleaning.

Pesci sat Risotto down on his couch a little while later with his little first-aid kit to change the bandages wrapped around his boo-boos. It would probably have been better to have taken him to a hospital, but giving all of the medical staff cardiac arrests would not be very practical. They’re healing well, at least!

“Why do humans clean even though things will just get dirty again?” Risotto asks Pesci.

“When dirty gunk and stuff builds up, sometimes it attracts critters like mice. And we don’t want that, especially since I don’t like having to kill them. So I catch them and put them outside!” Pesci answers chipperly and throws away the dirty bandages. 

“Ah…” Risotto assumes mice are a kind of land pest like the awful prickly urchins and stinging jellyfish that he has to carefully shoo away from his underwater home every day. Perhaps mice are covered in poisonous spines and tendrils as well? They must be terribly dangerous creatures, then. What other horrible horrors live on land anyway?

“Hey, Risotto! I’ve been meaning to ask you something!” Pesci interrupts his musings. 

“Yes, Pesci?”

“What do you think of my Fra? Do you like him?” He asks, earnestly.

Risotto thinks. “...I like his face. I like it when he gets flustered. I like the way he sways his hips when he walks. I like his cooking. I like his smile. I like it when he is being sincere with me now that he isn’t afraid of me. I like…” He rambles on and on about Prosciutto, and with every listing Pesci’s smile grows wider and wider.

“That’s really good, Risotto! I’m glad you like him a lot.” By the time Risotto’s done with his spiel, Pesci’s finished redressing his wounds. 

“Why is that?” Risotto piques. 

“Fra has been lonely for a while now. He may not look like it, but he’s a little sad. I think having a significant other in his life will be good for him! I just want my Fra to be happy.” 

“A… significant other?”

“Someone who he can be romantically invested in and be all lovey-dovey with, whether it be a guy or gal or someone in-between or a squishy and cute being of the sea. I don’t think Fra has a specific preference.”

“I am cute and squishy?”

“I adore you! ...not in the lovey dovey way because I only like girls. Well, I love everything from the sea so I might be a little biased. Oh, Fra thinks you’re cute and squishy too but don’t tell him I told you that!”

“Really?”

“Mhm! He’s starting to warm up towards you, I can tell.”

“That is good.” Risotto says with a happy tint to his voice.

“It is good!! Now go to bed, you must be tired after working so hard today.” Pesci gives him a ginger pat on the head. It’s soft.

“Dream well, Pesci.” 

“Goodnight, Risotto!!”

_________________

It’s another ordinary morning. Pesci leaves to go fishing, Prosciutto wakes up and makes breakfast (which is just reheating the food they made yesterday because they did make a _lot._ ) for himself and Risotto, and now they’re alone together in the house once more.

Now it’s just a matter of keeping this octopus creature with both the mentality of a sweet attention-seeking puppy and an evil cat who likes knocking things over entertained for the rest of the day.

“Prosciutto. Prosciutto I am bored. I demand some intellectual stimulation.” Risotto complains melodramatically. He’s laying on the top of the couch improperly. His tail is draped to the floor for added dramatic effect.

“Okay, don’t do anything stupid while I get you something to do.” Prosciutto ignores the desperate, unholy and indescribable noise coming from Risotto. If he _had_ to describe it it’s on the line between something from those zombie video games that Pesci’s friend Formaggio plays and a dying cockatoo.

He looks in his bedroom for something to give to Risotto. There’s his bed with the blanket, his wardrobe, and dresser. Basically nothing.

He goes to Pesci’s room to look instead. His walls are littered with pictures of him and his Fra, fish he’s caught and just nice pictures of the seascape and sea creatures in general. He has a desk against the wall with handmade fishing lures and art supplies (he likes drawing Prosciutto pictures and it melts his heart every time). Next to his bed is a toy box that, even though he’s in his 20’s like his Fra, refuses to throw away. 

The world doesn’t deserve to have Pesci. 

Prosciutto opens up the toy box. There’s a train set, stuffed cartoon animals (Pesci says they’re called Pokémon, whatever), various other toys, more art supplies, LEGOs, a Rubik’s cube and a 1000-piece jigsaw puzzle set with Bob Ross’s smiling face on it against a beautiful mountain painting with all those bushes and happy little trees. 

(The world doesn’t deserve to have Bob Ross either.)

He read somewhere that the latter two are _very_ intellectually stimulating, so hopefully they’re enough to sate Risotto. LEGOs are too, but the agonizing memory of stepping on a piece once is enough to dismiss that idea. He takes the Rubik’s cube and puzzle set into his hands and strolls downstairs.

“Ah! You are back, Prosciutto.” Risotto, who is literally just moments away from knocking over the vase of silk flowers, perks up seeing the blond. He shuffles away from the vase trying to look as innocent as possible. This doesn’t fool Prosciutto, but his puppy eyes elect him to not scold Risotto.

“Yea, I’m back big guy.” Prosciutto says, and sets the puzzle box down in the middle of the wooden living room floor along with the Rubik’s cube. Risotto hovers over the objects, curious as ever. 

“This is a Rubik’s cube,” Prosciutto answers the question on Risotto’s mind without having him ask, “It’s a puzzle where you turn the sides until the colors match. And this is a jigsaw puzzle. You stick the matching pieces together to make a picture. They’re Pesci’s, so be nice to them!”

“But they are inanimate objects. They do not have feelings.” Risotto thinks out loud and sits down on the floor with his legs crossed.

“...Just don’t break them, ok?” Prosciutto takes a seat on the couch and watches Risotto inspect the colorful cube with this sparkling curiosity in his eyes. It’s adorable, honestly.

“You turn the sides to solve it, yes?” Risotto observes and he flips a side of the cube.

“Yea.”

“Ok.” Risotto flicks the sides of the cubes up, down, left and right then within fifteen seconds the red, white, green, yellow, blue and orange are all lined up and solved. 

“Wow. You uh, you did it Risotto. Congratulations.”

The R’lyehian stares at it for a while in his hands. “Is something supposed to happen when you solve it?” 

“No? It’s just for entertainment.”

“I was expecting food to come out of it…” Risotto mumbles disappointedly. 

“!?!?” He really _is_ a dog.

Risotto stares in disgust at the cube for a little longer before setting it down on the floor. He moves on to the 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle. “Will the puzzle give me food or not?”

“Yea, the food of mental stimulation.” The blond drips with sarcasm. Risotto gives him a questioning look trying to process the tone of his voice, but he brushes it off and starts putting the puzzle together, gingerly picking up each piece by tiny piece with his relatively large hands and placing them together.

It’s nearly silent now, with only the faint calls of seagulls flying outside and the clicking of puzzle pieces together with claws. It’s totally not awkward at all, watching an eldritch being of the horrific depths play with a Bob Ross picture puzzle. Nooot in the slightest.

“So… How is your day so far?” Prosciutto attempts to break the silence.

“It is okay as of right now. What about you?” Risotto responds without looking up from the floor.

“It’s uh… it’s good.” The blond twiddles his thumbs, trying to think of a way to keep the conversation going. 

More silence.

“Prosciutto, do you still have questions for me? Like from the day we first met?” Risotto asks with a click of two puzzle pieces.

Well, that’s a way to go. But Prosciutto _really_ wouldn’t like to know of that cult-god-dream bullshit so he’s going to stick with the bare basic questions one would answer on their first date, rather than discover the sea’s other horrors. What questions to ask? There is a lot on his mind, but the blond doesn’t quite know where to start.

“Prosciutto? You are staring at nothing.”

“Oh, sorry.” Prosciutto snaps himself out of his thoughts. 

“We could we take turns asking questions? I am still very curious about humanity, the surface and as well as you.” Risotto suggests.

“Sure…” 

“I shall start first. What are the worst organisms that live on land? Pesci said there are pests on land.”

Prosciutto is seriously conflicted on whether he should fuck with Risotto or not, but he doesn’t need a 6’7”, approximately 250 pound monster with wings and a tail freaking out over something like a mouse and turning the house into a wooden heap of shreds. It’d be funny at first, though. “There are these insects called wasps and hornets that fly at you and sting you in the ass for no reason.”

“Like jellyfish?”

“Kind of? From the documentaries I’ve seen, jellyfish passively drift along and sting whatever they touch, but wasps are huge dickin’ assholes and sting because they’re in a constant state of pissed-offness. They don’t even sting to catch food or anything.”

“I see. Wasps sound terrible.”

“Mhm. But that’s the worst we get in Italy. That’s my home country where you are right now.”

Risotto tilts his head. “What _are_ the worst land organisms then?”

“Well. They’re all concentrated on this island hellscape of a country called Australia. Venomous snakes, huge spiders, giant fucking bats, weird colorful turkeys with velociraptor claws…” He trails off drumming his fingers on the couches’ armrest in thought of what Pesci has enthusiastically told him, “Then on top of that it has the most dangerous sea creatures. In the surrounding water there’s stonefish, sharks, more venomous snakes, and box jellyfish. Also called fucking sea wasps, not surprisingly.” He shivers, eternally thankful he lives by the Mediterranean Sea instead. The ocean is still fucking horrifying in any case.

Risotto stares at him for a few moments and Prosciutto can see his little brain gears churning. 

“So… that land continent I live east of harbors the most dangerous creatures of Earth as well as its sea?” The octopus asks, slowly and carefully. 

“You live by fucking Australia. Is that what you mean to tell me.” A confirmation, not a question. 

“Not really. R’lyeh is far east of it and far away from any land continent, but I go on trips to that continent’s sea once in a while to observe the pretty coral reefs and talk to the giant cuttlefish and tiny yellow octopuses with little blue rings on them,” He answers sounding nostalgic, “but I do run into those box jellyfish and sharks that you mentioned.”

Prosciutto does a little bit of mental geography. “So you live in the Pacific Ocean?”

“Is that what you humans named that region?”

“Uh-huh… so you swam all the fucking why from the middle of the Pacific, and all the way to the Mediterranean Sea.” _So that’s why he’s so fucking buff._

“Yes? Is that a terribly long distance?”

“THAT’S LIKE HALF OF THE FUCKING GLOBE!” Prosciutto shouts and marches upstairs. Risotto worries if he’s upset him, but to his relief Prosciutto comes back down with a map in hand.

He opens the world map up and faces it towards the winged creature sitting on the floor, pointing to the middle of the Pacific Ocean with his finger. “So you started here and there’s two ways you could’ve ended up here. One, you went this way,” he traces his finger past Australia and Asia, looping around Africa and up to the Mediterranean, “Or you went that way,” and his finger starts from the Pacific again going around South America through the Atlantic and right into where they are now.

Risotto looks more shocked than Prosciutto. “I really swam all that way, or is Earth that small?”

“I have no idea but why the hell did you swim so far?!”

“Oh. No particular reason. I simply wanted a change in scenery and I heard the sea north of the deserts had a lot of ancient human-made shipwrecks and ruins. I appreciate learning about human culture quite a bit, you see. I did see plenty of them before finding my way into your home.” His attention shifts back to the puzzle, which is only less than a quarter’s way completed. 

“You have wings… why couldn’t you just fly to go on your little vacations?” Prosciutto asks out of genuine curiosity.

“We are strongly advised against flying by The Great Old Ones. We are told that humans are far more scared of us than we are scared of them, and they’ll shoot us on sight with their weapons, which is exactly what you tried doing when we first met.” Risotto says with a slight smugness to his voice.

The two share a small chuckle. It makes Prosciutto feel warm on the inside.

“Well, I’m happy to say I’m not that scared of you anymore, Risotto.” The blond smiles, but it quickly fades.

“What is wrong?” Risotto looks up as if he felt his smile falter away.

“Will you… be going back home after your wounds are all healed?” He asks with downcast eyes.

Risotto stares at him blankly. “You told me and I quote, ‘You’re leaving my house as soon as you’re healed up.’”

“Well— Humans change their minds sometimes!” Prosciutto exclaims, flustered.

“In that case, I shall return to the ocean right now.” 

“Nooo! I didn’t mean it like that! Please don’t leave yet.” Prosciutto cries.

“I am only teasing you, Prosciutto. Now can you help me with the rest of this puzzle? Of course, we can continue talking and asking questions but I cannot seem to find the corresponding piece to this one side of the mountain…” 

__________

The warm evening sun has long disappeared under the horizon. Pesci, like most days out of the week, walks up the steps to his house. He stands in front of the door for a few moments, expecting to hear total chaos and mayhem like last time, but there’s dead silence. That’s _way_ more suspicious than loud ruckus.

He anxiously unlocks the door, peeking past the cracked opening searching for any danger.

Stepping in cautiously, he turns on the living room lights. 

There’s a completed puzzle —no, his amazing and spectacular Bob Ross painting jigsaw puzzle he got for one of his birthdays— on the floor along with two eaten plates of chicken parmigiana made yesterday, and on the couch is a sleeping Fra with his head leaning on the shoulder of a peacefully snoring Risotto.

They’re snug warm next to each other. Risotto’s good wing is tucked around Prosciutto, and his tail lays curled around him as well. 

Pesci may or may not have taken a picture before getting a blanket to cover the two.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I actually have in fact been to Australia, and those spiders really are as big as they are in those clickbait videos
> 
> R’lyeh also has exact coordinates by Lovecraft?? Wack


	8. (Not a Chapter, But a Long Footnote)

Hello, loyal readers! This is LordMarble speaking. I simply want to address some questions that pop up here, on Instagram and Tellonym regarding this fic that simply cannot fit on a footnote. Plus, I’m sick so I wanted to do a filler-type thingie.

 

**_”What the fuck is this?”_ **

The tale of a touch-starved blond bitch baby who learns who learns to overcome his ignorance and fear of people he doesn’t understand and the ocean when he meets a big-tiddied goth octopus. 

 

**_”Why the fuck did you write this?”_ **

To write the first Risopro monster fic. Basically I wanted to be inb4 the werewolf and vampire fics. Also to write a monster fic that ISN’T porn.

Not trying to hate on werewolves and vampires tho. I just wanted to bring something new to the table.

 

**_”What’s the inspiration behind this?_ **

Long and serious answer time! 

It’s a Metallica reference, the song being _The Call of Ktulu_ from the album _Ride the Lightning._ If we’re gonna make Risotto a monster, why not make him one after the band he named his stand?

Risotto also has very cephalopod-ish qualities (that’s not a real thing but it is now). The _dish_ Risotto Nero is dyed black with cephalopod ink. His ability allows him to camouflage just like an octopus, he’s detached a few limbs here and there, he’s METAL AS FUCK, a smart boi, and his striped pants remind me of the mimic octopus, the most goth species of the octopuses.

This is also why I give him the mimic as a fursona in the 7th chapter of _These Codenames are Stupid._

 

_**“What are Prosciutto and Pesci wearing?”** _

I purposely don’t mention this so you can imagine those two in whatever you want. Prosciutto could be in his normal suit, Pesci could be in his normal weird onesie… someone told me they imagined Prosciutto in a lacy maid outfit the entire time.

I however, imagine the brothers in pretty normal warm-weather clothing, Prosciutto wearing a collared button-up shirt and jeans, and Pesci in a T-shirt with shorts and sandals.

 

 _ **“What’s the time period?”**_

Same as Vento Aureo, near modern day.

 

**_”When’s the monster fucker smut coming?!”_ **

Once you write it yourself, you coward. Also PLEASE don’t show it to me.

 

**_“Are you a monster fucker?”_ **

I’d prefer to label myself as monster _fluffer_ , thank you very much. 

 

**_“What’s your favorite thing about writing this?”_**

Trying to think what an intelligent creature of the depths who so happens to speak English would do in a situation as being stuck in a human’s home, and what he would think of humans. What goes through his mind? What can he infer? What can he figure out to do like a velociraptor? I basically dedicate Chapter 6 _Risotto Nero Tries His Best_ to this. 

Of course, a sentient octopus creature with both tentacles and opposable thumbs would be very curious about his environment and ask a lot of questions and knock things over. On purpose.

 

**_“Are there any La Squadra members who are also monsters in this universe?”_ **

No idea but if I have to write another monster fic it’d be goblin or gremlin Ghiaccio. Not to write a heartwarming love story of acceptance, but because that’d be fucking hilarious.

 

**_“Hey, you shouldn’t write this! You’re disrespecting H.P. Lovecraft!”_ **

One, Lovecraft never states what is canon and what is NOT canon, as other authors from his time have contributed to his Mythos with their own stories. What I’m saying is that you don’t have to stick to the ‘source’ material. 

Two, he was a bigot and racist. I respectfully chose to disrespect him by fucking around with his characters. Also by making Cthulhu’s great grandson gay. 

Three, I know the concept of Cthulhu and his spawn are supposed to be horrifying, but… I love cephalopods to death, and I love dragons to death. You’re just ASKING me to hug them all.

I ADORE the Cthulhu Mythos. I just like fucking around with stuff.

________

 

Anyway, I have doodles of Cthulhi Risotto on my Instagram (@lordmarble) if you want to see him and I post previews and updates announcements of my fics on my story, so please follow me if you want to be caught up. Also I post polls for ideas for _These Codenames Are Stupid_ and this very fic so YOU may be responsible for the next chapter! 

Please don’t be afraid to DM me or leave comments if you have questions or ideas. I swear I don’t bite.

Thank you for reading! Reading your guys’ comments and seeing your kudos left here always warm my heart. :)


	9. Under the Sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fish are friends, and food

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> LordMarble is a nerd

Risotto yawns beneath his beard of tentacles and stretches out his arms. The morning sunshine filtering through the living room window curtains, the soft calls of flying seabirds outside and the faint lingering scent of homemade Italian food makes for a peaceful scene to take in with the senses (In addition, the completed puzzle on the floor of big strong mountains and happy little trees having a good time). He looks to his side, where a sleeping Prosciutto is comfortably leaning on his shoulder. Risotto doesn’t want to wake him, but he’s a deep sleeper. Plus, it’s nice being so close to him with this soft blanket atop of them keeping them warm.

He shuts his black and red eyes to rest for a while longer. Then, he perks up hearing Pesci walk down the stairs, all dressed up and ready to head out.

Seeing that he’s awake, “Good morning, Risotto.” Pesci greets him quietly to not wake up his Fra. 

“Good morning, Pesci. Are you leaving for fishing again?”

“Mhm.”

“May I accompany you today?” Risotto asks.

Pesci tilts his head. His neck makes a distinctive rubbery noise. “Don’t you want to hang out with Fra?”

“Of course I do,” he responds, “But I want to bring him something from the sea.”

“Oh. Then come along! Make sure no one sees you, though. I’ll leave a note on the table!”

“I will.” With a delicate touch, he moves Prosciutto off of his shoulder and lays him down on the couch, tucking him in the blankets and giving him a quick sucker kiss on the cheek.  
________ 

Prosciutto blinks awake and rubs his eyes. He vaguely remembers comfortably falling asleep with Risotto after completing the puzzle, and said puzzle on the floor confirms it wasn’t a dream. So where is Risotto…?

He looks behind the couch, then under it, peeks into the kitchen to see if he’s eating fish, walks upstairs to the bathroom only to not find him claiming the bathtub as his own personal mini pond, then to his bedroom to find no one.

 _Shit, did he actually leave!? Oh my God he wasn’t actually teasing me. He still needs to heal and I don’t want him getting hurt out there…_ He paces back and forth worriedly, and ultimately decides to dust down the entirety of the second floor to ease his nerves.

He completely missed the written note left on the the kitchen table stating that Risotto left with Pesci.  
________

“We caught a lot today, Risotto!” Pesci chirps happily as the two make their way up to the house.

“Yes. We caught many fish.” Though, many were eaten by the black hole called Risotto’s stomach right after they were dragged up with the net. Pesci didn’t mind too much.

“So what do you plan on doing with what _you_ caught?” 

“Oh,” Risotto says holding a large plastic bucket with seawater, “It is for Prosciutto. It is what I wanted to bring him.”

“Ok!” Pesci opens the door and before he even steps in, Prosciutto comes flying out with tears in his eyes.

“PESCI! RISOTTO IS GONE!” He cries and clings to his brother, “I DON’T KNOW WHY HE LEFT! I WOKE UP AND HE WAS GONE! THEN I CLEANED THE HOUSE OUT OF ANXIE—“

“Fra!! Please calm down, I left you a note saying he left with me to go fishing!”

“WHAT!?” Prosciutto’s head whips around and, upon seeing Risotto, his cheeks go bright red.

“I am alive and well, Prosciutto— oh. You are hugging my arm now.”

“Please don’t ever worry me like that again.” The blond cries into his bicep.

“Um…”

“Don’t worry about it, Risotto! He’s touchy-feely with people he likes.” Pesci giggles.

“Pesci, not right now!” Prosciutto lightly scolds his little brother as he shuffles them back into the house after their brief heartfelt reunion.

“Ok, Fra!” The younger brother smiles, and strolls off to the bathroom to shower off the salt on him.

“Risotto what is that?” Prosciutto points to the bucket he’s holding as he walks inside.

“This… is a bucket.” He answers, placing it on the floor gently. The water inside sloshes around still.

“Dear god…” 

“There is more.”

“Nooo.”

“Come sit down, Prosciutto.” Risotto pats the empty seat on the couch. Prosciutto obliges, lowering his _glorious_ ham butt onto the plush cushions. The blond gives him a questioning look, but the answer is given to him.

“It is to my knowledge that you are not fond of the ocean.” Risotto starts.

“Yea, no shit Sherlock.”

“My name is Risotto Nero. Oh. Was that a ‘figure of speech’?”

“Mhm.”

“Ah. To continue, I want to show you that there is no need to fear the ocean and its creatures.”

Prosciutto’s deep blue eyes (that ironically, match the sea) widen. “What. The fuck. Is in that bucket?” He asks, slowly and carefully.

“Friends.”

“Oh HELL no,” Prosciutto stands from the couch, “I am NOT gonna deal with no fucking clams OR crabs today—”

“Please, let me show you Prosciutto. I promise you shall not be hurt by them. They do not have pinchers.” The spawn of Cthulhu speaks softly, trying in his very best efforts to calm Prosciutto down.

Prosciutto sets his lips in a straight line and his eyebrows furrow in a mix of fear, frustration and reconsideration.

“Do you trust me, Prosciutto?” Risotto sincerely asks.

“...Yea. Yea I do, Risotto.” He sits back down with a sigh. He leans forward just a bit trying to peek into the bucket of seawater.

“Thank you, Prosciutto. Now.” Risotto dips his hands into the bucket of seawater. Prosciutto is anxiously waiting on the edge of his seat. “Pesci told me you are afraid of sharks.”

“They eat people! And they have teeth!” The blond exclaims, ready to leave the couch again.

“No, not all of them. It is true that some have attacked humans, but…” As delicately as an Eldritch being can, Risotto lifts up a little speckled, tan and slender creature that’s no more than 5 inches long, keeping his cupped hands submerged in the water. 

“...That is the TINIEST shark I’ve ever fucking seen.” The fearful but fascinated man comments.

“Mhm. Pesci said she is a small-spotted catshark. She is only a baby. Perhaps only hatched a week ago.” Risotto holds his hands still. Prosciutto holds his breath. The small shark rests in Risotto’s scaly palms, with its even smaller mouth opening and closing as it breathed.

“...”

“...”

Prosciutto keeps staring at the tiny cartilaginous fish. “What do you want me to do besides stare at it?”

“Pet her back.”

“WHAT!? With my BARE hands!?” He jumps.

“Gently. I will release her back in the sea later.” 

“I don’t WANT to I hate sharks— no. Risotto. Don’t give me those _damned_ puppy eyes. No. Bad octopus. No. No… fine.” Hesitantly, he rolls up his sleeves and reaches his hand out to the little shark.

Risotto’s tail thumps on the floor in victory. “Be very gentle. Use only one finger and lightly pet down her back. Do not touch her head or gills.”

“If it fucking bites me I’m going to not feed you for the rest of the day, Risotto.” The octofuck‘s tail comes to a stop. Prosciutto, with a somewhat shaky hand he’s trying so hard to hide, places a finger on the back of the shark pup, just in front of the dorsal fin. “Why isn’t it biting me?”

“Because she is very nice and docile.” Risotto answers. 

“I… guess she is.” The blond mumbles. He starts to pet the aquatic animal in Risotto’s palm. “Feels like fine sandpaper.” He eventually comments after a minute of TLC.

“Yes. Sharks have very rough scales.”

“She’s kinda cute I guess— nooo, come back!” Prosciutto cries in complete and utter despair when the shark wiggles away to the bottom of the bucket.

Risotto chuckles a bit, “Sadly, she wishes to not be pet anymore. But do not worry Prosciutto, there are more friends in here,” he scoops his hands back to the bottom of the bucket, but not for the baby shark. Prosciutto gawks in anticipation.

Risotto brings his clawed hands up to just under the surface of the seawater again. There is a blob resting in his cupped palms.

“The fuck is that…?” Feeling brave after encountering the ocean’s most feared predator, Prosciutto pokes the blob submerged in the water. The blob jiggles violently and suddenly turns a 180° in Risotto’s palm. Prosciutto makes a startled noise. Like an, “AH!”

The blob has a face. It bears big, oversized googly eyes for its tiny round body. Little short, stubby tentacles on its face cling to the Risotto’s scales. 

“W-What the fuck is that stupid thing?” Prosciutto chokes out amidst amused laughter and mild disturbance. When Prosciutto imagines a cephalopod, he thinks big with floppy long tentacles and dead eyes and overall unholiness but not… this. 

“Human! Please do not make fun of him, he is not stupid,” Risotto chastises him and pouts, or at least Prosciutto thinks he’s pouting, “I told him only nice things about you and he came all this way from the sea with me to meet you.” The little creature’s tentacles seem to wiggle in agreement.

“Sorry— I just— never seen anything like that before!” Prosciutto bubbles over in a fit of giggles and, just because of how adorable he finds it, Risotto instantly forgives him. 

“You are forgiven. Small friend, do you forgive the human?” Risotto bends his head down to the little creature, and more of its stubby tentacles wiggle. “He forgives you as well, Prosciutto.”

Prosciutto smiles like an idiot. “Hi baby!” He coos to the sentient blob sweetly.

“He is not a baby, he is an adult Atlantic bobtail squid.” Risotto corrects.

“An adult!? Oh my God that just makes you even more precious. You’re so tiny even though you’re all so grown up!!” Prosciutto doesn’t realize he’s baby talking to the squid like an owner to their puppy. He reaches his finger out and affectionately pets the bobtail down its mantle. 

Risotto lowers his head down to the squid again. “He thanks you for calling him precious. He is also enjoying the attention.”

Prosciutto quirks an eyebrow. “You can understand him?” He continues to shower the little baby in affection.

“Of course. The spawn of the Great Old Ones can understand one another, no matter how distant we are in terms of bloodline.” The R’lyehian answers.

The Italian man, really not wanting to know more about this ‘Great Old Bullshit’ tries to change the subject, “What did you tell him about me?”

Risotto nearly drops the squid back into the water. “O-Oh. Um… I told him… you are a very pretty human… and… smart and… kind… and sassy… and, uh… pretty… oh I… already said… you are… pretty…” He trails off, avoiding all eye contact with the blond.

Prosciutto’s smug smile is unmistakable, and so is the pinkish hue forming under Risotto’s scales and skin of his face. “What? Keep going. I’m listening, Risotto.”

“Uh… I must put them back in the sea, they are very sensitive creatures. Goodbye, Prosciutto.”

“Hey! Come back! Risotto!” But it’s too late, Risotto grabbed the bucket and leapt out the door for the beach, under the warm evening sun.

Pesci comes down from his shower in a fresh change of pajamas a few moments after. “Where did Risotto go?”

“I embarrassed him so he ran outside.” Prosciutto mutters with his head in his hands.

“Oh. He’ll come back!”

“I know.”

“...so did you like the sea creatures?”

Prosciutto’s eyebrows knit in thought. “Pesci, do you know if it’s legal to keep a cute and squishy cephalopod?”

Pesci giggles. “You already have Risotto, Fra!”

“Shut up!”  
________

Risotto waddles into the beach’s water until he’s in knee-deep with the bucket. He gingerly lowers it down until it’s submerged, and waves goodbye to the shark pup as it swims out of it and back home. The bobtail squid however, stays. He clings to the bottom with his suckers, peering up at Risotto with his googly eyes.

“...you may go back home now, small friend.” He finally says. He gives the bucket a gentle shake.

In a tiny voice that only a spawn of Cthulhu can hear and comprehend, “How the FUCK are you so embarrassed talking to the human but you have no problem giving him kisses or talking ABOUT him!?”

“It… it is complicated.” He answers the squid.

“Explain!”

“I do not know how to explain that phenomenon other than it is because of the emotion of love. I suddenly cannot think properly when I think about Prosciutto like that. I was very embarrassed back there.”

“You could’ve NOT answered his question! Or lied to him. You’re not OBLIGATED to answer the inquiries of a _lowly_ human.” He raises a tentacle, assertively pointing it at Risotto.

“I wish to be genuine with Prosciutto. Additionally, I would feel guilty if I were to lie straight to his gorgeous, soft face…” He spaces out at the thought.

“...you’re so deep in, Risotto.”

“The water is only up to my knees.”

“No! I mean you’re so deep in love you fucking snail!” The mini-spawn of Cthulhu snaps wrathfully. Keep in mind, he can fit in the palm of your hand.

“Please go home. I wish to return to Prosciutto.” Risotto grumbles and gives the bucket a slightly rougher shake.

“SIGH. I’m rooting for you, dude. Peace out.” And with that, the little googly-eyed squid swims off into the deep unknown.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nerd LordMarble speaking. Bobtail squid are blessings on earth, PLEASE look them up.


	10. A Tentacle and a Leg

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We get a little bit of backstory for Prosciutto and we see some more La Squadra members in this universe

Risotto slips back into the house, as silent as if he were an assassin in some alternate universe. It’s quiet, dark and the warm summer sun has sunk beneath the horizon. Maybe if his wing was healed he could have flew back here in half the time and see Prosciutto before the night settled in, instead of walking. He and his brother are probably in bed by now. 

He crawls onto the couch cushions he’s grown to know as his bed here. It’s cold. At first, he found them luxurious compared to the seafloor of rocks and sand— but both are cold and lonely. The couch was a lot warmer with Prosciutto on his shoulder, and with the blanket on top of him. Risotto would love to have Prosciutto beside him as he slept tonight, but he doesn’t want to disturb his rest.

Wings of scales and leather wrap around himself to keep warm and he drifts off into the dream world peacefully. Or at least, he tries to. 

The image of Prosciutto’s smug smile from earlier lingers in his octobrain. The memory of his cute laugh seeing the little squid. Just. HIM. HE. The bobtail squid was right: Risotto is so deep in the pit called love and he can’t climb out. 

He wants to speak with great grandfather Cthulhu for advice on how to handle these overwhelming emotions, but that requires falling asleep and entering REM. And he can’t even relax himself. He tosses and turns on the couch wrapped up in his wing burrito in turmoil for the rest of the night.

Risotto Nero doesn’t like having feelings, but he sure does like Prosciutto.  
______________

“Hey, Risotto. Risotto? Wake up, goddammit.” Prosciutto shakes his shoulder, trying to awaken the eldritch beast of horrors. He’s crouched down in front of the couch to his eye level.

Risotto grouchily hisses and turns away from him in a state of half-awakeness.

“I made breakfast for you! Cmon, wake up. Please?” The blond holds out a plate of fried fish fillet.

Risotto rolls himself back around. His tentacles latch onto the fish like they have a mind of their own and pull it to his mouth. He weakly bites it before almost slipping back into unconsciousness.

Prosciutto sighs. “Did you get any sleep last night?”

Risotto makes an unholy, eldritch and cranky noise in response.

“Ok, I’ll leave you alone then. I was planning on going out today anyway, so...” Prosciutto stands up and puts on a pair of shoes.

Risotto instantly perks up like a dog realizing his owner is going to disappear to the dreaded ‘workplace’. “Where are you going?”

“Nowhere.”

He narrows his eyes, mostly because his eyelids are heavy. “How can you be going nowhere if you said you are going out?”

Prosciutto lets out a small laugh. That fucking cute laugh. “I’m not going to tell you. It’s a secret.”

Risotto tries to keep his composure. It’s a good think his tired brain can only register about half of what’s going on. “What kind of secret?”

“Eh… It has something to do with yesterday. Ciao, Risotto.” With a swing of those hips (or maybe he’s just imagining it) Prosciutto exits the house.

Risotto Nero passes out right when the front door shuts. He never got to eat his breakfast. The fish is still stuck to his suckers.

He doesn’t dream of Cthulhu, but he and Prosciutto frolicking together among bright coral and sea lilies. It’s a good thing dreams don’t conform to logic.  
___________

Sometime later in the afternoon, the lock to the door clicks open and Prosciutto steps inside carrying a medium sized cardboard box with holes on the top tucked under his arm. Risotto, now far more rested than he was in the morning, blinks awake hearing the door open. He stretches like a cat and sits up on the couch.

“You are back, Prosciutto.”

“That’s right, I’m back.” Prosciutto states as a matter-of-factly and sits down on the couch with the box on his lap. Risotto, as curious as ever, inclines himself towards it.

“You know how you brought me sea creatures yesterday, Risotto?” The Italian starts.

“Oh! Do you have land creatures in that box?” Risotto says with excitement, though his face is as stoic as ever.

“Mhm. I asked a friend of mine if I could borrow his pets.”

“Someone just… gave you their pet?” Risotto questions, and further questioning the human species.

“My excuse was I wanted some emotional support and Pesci isn’t home. Also I’m pretty sure Melone has -69 brain cells. Well, whatever!” Prosciutto opens up the box and pop goes the weasel. Or in this case, pop goes the _ferret._

Risotto screams. “PROSCIUTTO! WHAT IS THAT!?” He backs up to the end of the couch, as far away from the creature as possible. 

“Risotto, she’s just a ferret!” Prosciutto holds up the cream colored mustelid by the underarms, “She’s my friend Melone’s named Fettuccine.”

“I do not trust that so-called ‘ferret’, Prosciutto.” Risotto hisses at the ferret (who doesn’t give a shit), and now he’s crouched on the couch’s armrest on all fours.

“Why not…?” Prosciutto asks, outwardly confused and inwardly laughing his ass off.

“It is covered in poisonous barbs!” 

Prosciutto snorts. “What?!”

“Fireworms and sea urchins have the same defense mechanism! Put that down or you will suffer agonizing, burning pain!”

“You… think Fettuccine’s fur is actually venomous spines?” Prosciutto chuckles.

“I KNOW they are venomous spines— OH MY AZATHOTH THERE IS ANOTHER ONE.” Risotto screeches in fear when a white ferret pokes its head out of the box.

“That’s Alfredo. He’s perfectly harmless, Risotto.”

“I strongly doubt your judgement, Prosciutto.” Risotto skeptically snaps at him, visibly getting tenser when Alfredo clambers out of the box and waddles his way towards this strange new octopus creature. “IT IS GOING TO STING ME, PROSCIUTTO.”

“He’s only going to sniff you! He likes new people.”

Risotto freezes like a statue when Alfredo stands up on his hind legs. “I am going to die.”

“Well look who’s being an irrational idiot.” The Italian man says smugly.

“I see what you did th—“ Alfredo’s tiny pink nose boops one of Risotto’s dangling tentacles, “ _ **SCREEEEECH**_ ”

Prosciutto doesn’t know what happened. One second Risotto is in front of him, the next second there’s a disembodied tentacle squirming on the couch cushions like a gecko dropping its tail, and Risotto is clinging to the fucking ceiling with his claws. 

“HEY RISOTTO UM WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK!?” Prosciutto shrieks in fright.

“My sincerest apologies! It is a reflex, I will drop a tentacle or limb when a predator grabs ahold of it!” He rapidly explains, dropping down from the ceiling and leaving gaping holes in it. Bits of plaster and whatever an average Italian ceiling is made of crumble and drop on top of his hat. 

“FERRETS CAN’T HURT YOU— OH MY GOD YOU’RE BLEEDING FROM YOUR FACE! SHIT! CAN WE STITCH THIS THING BACK ON YOU BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE!?” Prosciutto blabbers out in a panic and tries picking up the moving appendage, away from the cat snakes thinking that it’s a weird fur-less friend. 

“Do not worry about that! It will grow back with time!”

“IT’LL _WHAT!?_ ” The blond sputters as he tries putting Fettuccine and Alfredo back in the box. They scamper out shortly after.

“Of course! Do humans not grow back their limbs upon losing them!?” This is another thing Risotto does not know about the human species.

“NO!?”

“T-Then what do humans do when they lose a limb…?”

Prosciutto inhales, calming himself down and putting the box lid over the ferrets. “Humans get prosthetics, Risotto.”

“A prostate-tick?”

“No, a prosthetic! A fake replacement limb.” He corrects, still a bit too freaked out to laugh at his misunderstanding.

Risotto isn’t quite convinced. “Seriously. You humans really cannot regenerate your lost body parts?” 

“We… can’t Risotto. We just can’t.”

“How would you know? Have you lost a limb before?” Risotto asks, picking up his loose tentacle and chucking it away into a trash bin in the corner.

The blond sighs. He lifts up his right leg onto the couch cushion and rolls up his pant sleeve. It reveals a metal prosthetic leg going down from his knee to a fairly realistic foot. He makes a gesture to it, “This is my leg prosthetic. I have it because legs don’t grow back for humans.”

Risotto stares at it. “Does it come off?”

“Of course— RISOTTO! GIVE THAT BACK!” Prosciutto cries when the (octo)fucking asshole plucks it from its base.

“Such a fascinating contraption,” Risotto comments, holding the fake leg and his suckers get ahold of it, “You humans never cease to amaze me with your technology.” It’s now hidden within the beard of tentacles. Faint clicks of beak on metal are heard.

“Are you chewing on it!?”

“How come I have not known about this, Prosciutto?” Risotto piques, ignoring his question. 

“Why would I tell a stranger right when I meet them that I’m missing a leg? Like I just walk up to them all, ‘Oh boohoo I lost my leg PLEASE PITY ME! I’M A FUCKING CRIPPLE!’ Also because the subject matter never came up! Until now. And I… guess you’re privileged enough to know about it now.” Prosciutto grumbles, mad that he’s telling Risotto this and the fact that his leg is out of his reach.

Risotto tilts his head. “I have seen you sleeping before. Do you not take it off?”

“I sleep with it on and it’s waterproof so I can shower with it.”

“You do not walk when you sleep. There is no reason to leave it on.”

Prosciutto’s eyebrows knit together, an angry look that contrasts the now melancholy dimness in his eyes. “I… strongly prefer having it on me. I don’t like thinking about it. It’s fucking embarrassing.”

“Why not?” Risotto asks. He’s still gnawing on the metal. It tastes like metal, surprisingly enough.

“Getting funny looks and insults from people on the street is one thing but another thing is… remembering how I lost it.” 

Risotto keeps staring at him.

He hesitates. “It… it involved Pesci not paying attention, me falling instead, an express train and a lot of blood. That’s why I don’t work anymore and stay at home. Ok? End of discussion.”

Risotto blinks, trying to read his tone and expression. “I am sorry for piquing, Prosciutto.”

“Whatever, it’s fine. Can I have my leg back?”

The oversized octopus gives him the puppy eyes and keeps biting at it. “But I like it.” 

“I NEED it to WALK, Risotto. I’ll… buy you a chew toy in exchange?”

“A chew toy…?” Risotto contemplates it for a moment, “I am curious as to what that feels like on my beak so I will give this back to you,” and drops the prosthetic leg next to Prosciutto. There’s not a single scratch on it.

Prosciutto shoves it back to his stump and stands up, “Thanks for not leaving any bite marks on it. And… Sorry for making you lose a tentacle,” he takes the box and picks up the ferrets running around by the scruff.

“I am sorry for taking your prosthetic.”

“It’s fine Risotto. Really. Just don’t do it again.” The blond softly says and starts for the door.

“Wait, Prosciutto.”

“Yes?”

“...Thank you for opening up to me. Even if it was only a little.”

Prosciutto says nothing, but he flashes a small and yet warm, sincere smile before exiting the house.

__________

Prosciutto, now much farther from the beach and in the seaside town, knocks on the door of a fairly modest house. A French-Italian accent answers, “Come in! The door is unlocked!”

He opens the door with the box of ferrets tucked under his arm. He’s immediately greeted by a lanky, lavender-haired man with an eyepatch over his right eye. “Bonjour, Prosciutto!”

“Ciao, Melone,” The blond smiles warmly, “Thank you for letting me have Fettuccine and Alfredo for a while.”

“It’s my pleasure! Did they help calm you down?” Melone asks as he gently takes the box from Prosciutto. He can tell his cat snakes are in there from the rustling and bouncing around at his presence.

“They… got into a little trouble, but they helped a lot.” 

“Trouble? Was Alfredo trying to steal anything remotely shaped like a ferret?” The one-eyed man chuckles out. He knows his sentient noodles can be little bastards.

“Oh uh… yea! Yea he was.” Prosciutto chuckles nervously.

Melone quirks an eyebrow. 

“It was nice having them!” Prosciutto says rather rushed, “I’ve got to go do some shopping now! Ciao.”

“Wait, don’t you want some coffee or anything…?” Melone is interrupted when Prosciutto abruptly leaves and closes the door behind him.

“WELL THAT WAS FUCKING RUDE OF HIM!” A pissed off voice says coming down the stairs. A short man with stylish red glasses and curly blue hair comes stomping down the stairs, angry beyond belief that someone would _dare_ leave without drinking his boyfriend’s wonderful homebrewed coffee.

“He had his reasons, Ghiaccio! At least he brought my babies back.” Melone says with cheeriness in his voice. He plops down on the floor with the box and opens it to release his ferrets into the living room…

And then he screams.

“MELONE WHY ARE YOU SCREAMING?!”

“T-THERE’S A THING IN HERE!”

“ARE YOU SURE IT’S NOT YOUR FERRETS?!”

“THEM, AND WHATEVER _FUCK THIS **THING IS!**_ ”

Ghiaccio walks over under the impression that Melone is being irrational, but no. Among the two innocent ferrets is some kind of squirming, writhing appendage covered in black and white stripes and suckers.

“...is this a fucking tentacle dildo? What the FUCK IS PROSCIUTTO INTO!?” Ghiaccio screams both disturbed and confused, and very carefully lifts the tentacle out with a pair of chopsticks. Upon closely examining it for a few seconds, “NEVERMIND. IT’S FUCKING REAL. I CAN SEE THE MUSCLE TISSUE AND SHIT.”

Melone is on the floor, borderline hyperventilating, “WHAT IS THAT AND WHAT IS THAT DOING IN THERE!?”

Ghiaccio squints his eyes, “I WOULD CLASSIFY THIS AS THE ARM OF A _THAUMOCTOPUS MIMICUS_ BUT THIS IS ABNORMALLY LARGE FOR THAT SPECIES.”

“AREN’T THOSE INDIGENOUS TO THE INDO-PACIFIC!?” The nerd screams at the other nerd.

“YES.”

“SO WHAT THE HELL IS THAT DOING AMONG MY SWEET BABIES!?” Melone clutches his ferrets close for comfort. 

“I HAVE NO FUCKING IDEA! PROSCIUTTO DOESN’T EVEN LIKE SEA CREATURES!” 

“MAYBE HIS BROTHER IS PRANKING US!?”

“YOU KNOW PESCI IS TOO WHOLESOME FOR THAT, MELONE!”

They screech for five minutes, getting their confusion and fear out and finally settling down.

“Let’s think about this. Why was this giant arm of a mimic octopus in the box?” Ghiaccio states the question at hand cooly, “We know Prosciutto would never have a pet octopus. We also know that they don’t have the time and resources to keep a giant monster cephalopod.”

“It could be Pesci’s pet? But again. They could never have one as a pet,” Melone ponders, “and a bigger question is how my ferrets ended up with it. They couldn’t have possibly stolen it off of a monster octopus, no matter how clever they are.”

“Hm,” Ghiaccio thinks, “There’s only one way to find out.”

“And what would that be?”

He pushes up his glasses and they glare white in the classic anime style. “We’re going to investigate.”

“What do you mean?”

“WE’RE GONNA BREAK AND ENTER, YOU DIMWIT!”

“I’M PRETTY SURE THAT’S ILLEGAL?!”

“SO IS HAVING A GIANT OCTOPUS FOR A PET, HYPOTHETICALLY SPEAKING!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hgh I hope Prosciutto’s little backstory thing didn’t feel too forced I wanted him to have a little something from the anime and a more valid reason for him to be at home


	11. The Investigation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ghiaccio and Melone are the best idiots in the world

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick note, if you’ve read These Codenames are Stupid, then everyone’s ethnicities and races carry over from said fic (Except for Risotto lol).

Another day has passed, after what may have possibly been the craziest day for Risotto Nero. He had a face-to-face encounter with a land creature called a ‘ferret’, lost a tentacle to said ferret and learned much about Prosciutto. Then he received a ‘chew toy’ from Prosciutto which he said is meant for these tropical birds called parrots (and it’s really just a bunch of colorful wooden blocks strung together on rope), but Risotto finds it perfect to gnaw on. It can’t get any more eventful for Risotto Nero and hopefully things from now on will be quiet and peaceful.

Nah. This is LordMarble writing. But first, let us rewind to the previous day.  
_______

“I don’t know how you two talked me into this, but here I am.” A man with several pigtails says.

“Trust me Illuso, we need your charm for this to work,” Melone mutters, “How else are we supposed to get Prosciutto out of the house?”

“And why do you guys need Prosciutto out, again?” The MJ rip-off asks, unconvinced.

“BECAUSE WE FOUND A GIANT TENTACLE IN A BOX HE GAVE BACK TO US!?” Ghiaccio yells and holds said tentacle up, “SO WHILE WE BREAK IN, YOU’RE GONNA TRY AND GET AS MUCH OUT OF PROSCIUTTO AS FUCKING POSSIBLE REGARDING THE POSSIBILITY OF AN OCTOPUS MONSTER IN HIS HOUSE.”

“Hm,” Illuso ponders, “That sounds rather fake but interesting. Besides, I’d like to take out a guy as handsome as him.” He winks.

“EVEN IF HE COULD POSSIBLY HAVE A TENTACLE HENTAI FETISH?”

“Hey, we don’t know that yet! That’s why we have this sneaky lil’ bitch Illuso here!”

_______

There is a knock on the door. Risotto’s head snaps up from the couch and Prosciutto comes out of the kitchen. Without a word, Risotto scrambles upstairs to hide and the blond cautiously opens the door and peeks out behind it.

Illuso waves. “¡Hola, Prosciutto!”

“Illuso? Hi! How have you been doing?” _And what the hell is he doing here all of a sudden?_ Prosciutto thinks to himself.

“Good! Hey, it’s been a while so why don’t you and I hang out for lunch? As amigos, you know!”

Prosciutto raises an eyebrow in suspicion. “This is… sudden of you.”

“Well, you know me! I’m always full of surprises~” Is Illuso’s flirtatious, yet cryptic response.

“Uh…”

“I was thinking of that café down by the beach. What do you say, eh?”

Feeling socially pressured to say yes, “Give me ten minutes to make myself look more presentable.”

“Ok!” Illuso says, and the door is shut in his face. Prosciutto rushes upstairs to his bedroom to do his hair in their signature buns. 

“Is the stranger gone yet?” A deep, rumbling voice says from beneath Prosciutto’s blankets.

“Actually no,” Prosciutto responds dully, “Illuso wants to take me out for lunch. We’re friends, you see.”

“Oh. You are leaving then?” Risotto asks sounding rather disappointed. His head pokes out from under the blankets and watches the blond brush out his feathery locks in the dresser mirror. Oh great Azathoth, he’s so damn pretty. 

“Mhm.” Prosciutto meticulously ties those buns into place with hair pins and bands. They look fantastic, but Risotto Nero personally prefers seeing his hair down. He wants to run his hands through it.

The two sit in comfortable silence for a while. The octopus watches Prosciutto start patting some kind of powder to his face, then apply some color to his lips and black lines on his eyelids.

“What are you putting on your face?”

“Cosmetics. It’s to enhance my looks and make me more... pretty.” Prosciutto hums.

“But Prosciutto, that is unnecessary. You do not need to ‘enhance your looks’ when you are already at the peak of beauty.” Risotto has _no_ idea where he got the courage to say that or how that came out of his beak without a single fuck up.

Prosciutto nearly drops his eyeliner. The foundation he just applied isn’t enough to hide the pink in his cheeks.

“Was that… too much, Prosciutto?” The R’lyehian asks anxiously.

The blond says nothing. He gets up from the dresser with an expressionless face and marches over to where Risotto sits. He shrinks back in fear and he braces himself, eyes squeezing shut and tensing up.

“I am sorry—” Risotto squeaks out, but when Prosciutto leans down and presses those soft lips to his forehead in a kiss all his worries melt away. His crimson red eyes pop open in surprise, meeting the deep ocean blue gaze of Prosciutto and a smile softer than the kiss itself.

His tail has never thrashed so violently before.

“I’ll be back soon, ok Risotto?” Prosciutto’s knuckles run gently down Risotto’s squishy cheek that’s no brighter than a scorching hot flame on some seriously strong fuel.

“Ok.” Risotto says emotionlessly, trying to play it cool. 

The blond chuckles, seeing right through his forced stoicism. “Don’t destroy the house while I’m gone, ok?” 

“Ok.” 

Prosciutto smiles warmly and his hand loses contact with Risotto’s face, sadly. “I’ll see you later.”

“Goodbye, Prosciutto.”

When Prosciutto walks out of the bedroom, Risotto Nero faints.

Illuso, as patient as ever, had been chilling at the front porch waiting. Right when Prosciutto opens the door in his makeup and signature hairstyle, “Looking good, sexy!” He whistles.

“Thank you.” Prosciutto says, grinning from ear to ear even before that compliment.

“What’s gotten you so happy, hm?” Illuso piques smugly.

“Oh, nothing. Cmon, let’s go.”

___________

“Okay Melone, do you know where Prosciutto puts his spare keys?”

“Ghiaccio babe, this was your idea so I would assume _you_ would know.”

“...fuck you’re right. Let’s KICK THE DOOR DOWN!”

“What if there’s an actual octopus monster and it attacks us for breaking the door?”

“FUCK YOU’RE RIGHT!”

The two bumbling idiots start searching the front porch for any sign of a spare key. They eventually find it beneath a pot of scarlet begonias. Ghiaccio takes the honors of violently jamming the key into the lock and miraculously doesn’t break anything while opening the door. With Melone behind him, he creaks the door open and peeks inside. 

Nothing happened when he opens the door, so he slips in and Melone closes the door behind them. So far so good with their investigation for a hypothetical giant octopus pet.

“Ok, Melone. Let’s look around.” Ghiaccio commands.

“Okaaaaaaaaaaaay,” The lavender haired man immediately takes notice of the heavy dip in the cushions of one of the two leather couches, “OwO what’s this?”

“If you ever fucking say that again I’m breaking up with you, Melone.”

“No really, I found something suspicious.” Melone waves him over and the short gremlin comes scuttling.

“What’d you find?”

“Look!” He pulls a pair of medical tweezers from his pocket and plucks a smooth, white scale off of the couch. 

“That’s weird. Prosciutto doesn’t fucking like snakes!” Then Ghiaccio sees a bird chew toy on the same couch. “Never knew he liked birds either!”

Melone drops the scale in a ziplock bag and picks up the toy. With a somewhat faked yet real analytical voice, “The marks on this are small yet very deep. The way they’re shaped would point towards a parrot, but we would _know_ if a parrot was here due to squawking,” and hands it off to Ghiaccio.

“So why the fuck would he buy a chew toy!?”

“Nooo idea, babe.” Melone mindlessly responds as he finds more and more black and white scales on the couch. Once he finishes gathering them, he stands up and his jaw drops to the fucking floor.

“What?”

“That.” Melone points to the claw marks and holes in the ceiling.

Ghiaccio takes off his glasses, wipes them off, and puts them back on. “What the fuck!? What kind of Monster Hunter bullshit are we doing!?”

“Babe, your video games aren’t real… but with the scales and the holes in the ceiling and the fact we’re tracking down a hypothetical monster…” Melone trails off.

The shorter nerd huffs. “This is fucking bizarre.”

“Quite the bizarre adventure we’ve embarked on, oui?” The taller nerd notes.

“Damn right. Let’s go check another fucking room.”

“Okaaay!”

They begin to tiptoe their way upstairs, but once the duo make it to the hallway they freeze in place. There’s the faint sound of snoring. Coming from Prosciutto’s bedroom.

 _“...Illuso DID get Prosciutto out of the house, right?”_ Melone whispers.

 _“We fucking saw him walk out with Illuso while we were hiding in the bushes!”_ Ghiaccio whisper-screams back. He shuffles towards the closed door and, mustering every bit of courage and pride he has, places his hand on the bedroom door knob and turns it.

_“...what are you waiting for Ghiaccio? Open it!”_

_“I’m scared as hell right now!”_ He finally admits.

 _“Ghiaccio,”_ Melone sighs mid-sentence, _“Fine. I’ll help you open it.”_ Slowly, he pushes the door open. The pair peek around the opened door into the bedroom, and there is absolutely nothing out of the fucking ordinary.

Besides the snoring mound beneath Prosciutto’s blankets, of course.

_“...now what, Melone?”_

Melone procures a pen from his pocket. _“We poke it. In the name of science.”_

_“Don’t you wanna fucking see what’s under there first before you fucking poke it!?”_

_“Nope.”_ Melone warily approaches the blanket with pen in hand.

He pokes the source of the sound, and a jolting movement is made with a cranky sounding hiss comes from the sheets. Melone leaps back farther than Ghiaccio can ever imagine. He hands the pen to his boyfriend, shaking.

_“Please lift up the blanket for me, babe.”_

_“No fucking way, Melone.”_ Ghiaccio looks up at his taller boyfriend, and he’s giving him the infamous puppy eye (he only has one eye). He’s too powerful.

The blue-haired man inhales, and exhales. _You can do this. The possibility of this being an actual octopus monster is minimal. They don’t have scales and they don’t need chew toys. It’s probably a… a… goddammit, I don’t fucking know._

He approaches the blanket with great caution. Inch by inch, he shuffles towards the bed with the pen out on guard. He swallows and tries to keep his composure, mentally and physically bracing himself for whatever may come. Slowly, he pushes pillow after pillow out of the way, levering the pen under the blanket and, realizing a writing utensil makes a terrible crowbar for a blanket, shoves his hands under the sheets and quite literally yeets it away.

Whatever preparation Ghiaccio made wasn’t enough, and he throws himself high into the air and screams in horror. Melone screams too.

The snoring is coming from a… a thing. A monster. It’s roughly humanoid with a black and white striped body, covered in reptilian scales. Bat-like wings protrude from its shoulders, and a long tail slithers down its backside. Curved, sharp claws end its slightly webbed finger tips. Its head is that of a _Thaumoctopus mimicus,_ and the nub on its face amongst its tentacles confirms that this is where the ferrets got it from. Also on its head: A lipstick mark.

The most hideous part of this thing is the outfit. It looks like some kind of fucking goth BDSM clown from 2008, or a Hot Topic reject.

It’s sleeping as far as the pair can tell. Its eyes are closed and it made no response to them screaming Bloody Mary. It also looks _so_ comfortable on Prosciutto’s bed lying on its side, that the two doubt it’s going to wake up anytime soon.

Melone is the first to speak with a fascinated perk in his voice. “Oh no. It’s hot.”

“You see the hypothetical octopus monster we’ve been theorizing about and it’s fucking real and in front of us and THAT’S the first thing you say!?”

“But look!” Melone gestures to the creature’s large, bara tiddies, “Have you ever seen such beauty in your life!? Now THAT is hot.”

“...huh. I guess those are the biggest pair of fucking tits I’ve seen in my whole fucking life,” Ghiaccio comments after a good long look, “But that’s not why we’re fucking here!” 

“Ah yes, now we need to figure out what this is and what it’s doing here.” Melone puts his hand to his face like the classic thinking emoji.

“Yea…”

The French-Italian man looks at the creature up and down, mentally taking note of its most important features (its pectoral and abdominal muscles, obviously). _The kinky outfit… the bandages on various parts of its body… the lipstick stain on its forehead… the fact that it’s in Prosciutto’s room on his bed…_

_Ah._

“I figured it out.” Melone pipes up after a moment of highly intellectual thinking.

Ghiaccio’s brow furrows. “Huh?”

“Prosciutto is a sadistic kinky bitch and this is his bondage sex slave.” Melone bluntly and shamelessly states.

“...first of all, we all know damn well Prosciutto is a submissive as hell bottom and second of all, now is NOT THE FUCKING TIME TO BE HORNY?!”

“Well I KNOW the first part because he’s a Virgo, but I’m being serious—!!”

“Prosciutto is a submissive? I am very pleased to hear that… oh. Who are you two?” A deep, rumbling tenor suddenly asks.

Melone and Ghiaccio freeze up from their own adrenaline.

The monster woke up. And it can talk.

___________

The sea breeze gusts along the outdoor café. Sitting amongst the tables with delicious food before them are Prosciutto and Illuso.

“Thanks for taking me out, Illuso. It gets a little stuffy at home sometimes.” Prosciutto takes a bite of the shrimp scampi he ordered, looking at the pigtailed man who took him here in the first place. He was reluctant to leave his house but this is a nice change.

“Don’t thank me, I just thought you’d like the food here!” Illuso chuckles.

“Oh please, I love the food.” The blond’s gaze begins to wander off. Illuso watches his eyes trail off towards the ocean not too far away.

After observing the subtle expressions and twitches in his face, “So… who’s on your mind Prosciutto?” He drums his fingers on the table mindlessly. 

“Hm?” Prosciutto responds with a mouthful of shrimp.

“You seemed a little lost in thought, is all. That sparkle in your eyes is like that of a anime school girl fantasizing about the hottest guy in class.” Illuso says smugly yet poetically.

Prosciutto sets his lips together in a line to hide his expression. 

“Is there someone you have your eyes on? Some fair maiden or _dashing_ lad?”

“No.”

“Is it me?~” Illuso flutters his lashes and props his elbow on the table, resting his chin in his palm.

“No!” 

“Dammit. Can you at least give me a hint? Describe what they look like? Pretty please?”

“No!?”

Illuso inhales sharply through his nose. “I bring you out here and pay for your lunch and this is what I get?”

“Yes,” Prosciutto takes another bite of his food and swallows, then reconsiders with how damn delicious it tastes, “Maybe I’ll tell you a little bit about him.” He mumbles under his breath. 

“Oh, it’s a him? What’s he look like~?” Illuso asks, fully interested in spilling this tea instead of investigating what he came here for in the first place.

“He’s… really tall. Like well over 6’5” kind of tall and has really big toned muscles and broad shoulders. But he’s super sweet and gentle, though! He’s pretty scary at first with his red eyes but… sometimes you need to look past things like that.” Prosciutto twirls a loose lock of hair from his bangs, not paying attention to Illuso who’s taking mental note of everything. And of course, Illuso notices he’s sort of on a mental autopilot mode.

“Where did you meet him?”

“On the beach.” He sighs longingly.

“Oh, how romantic! What’s his favorite food?” Illuso delves into the gossip enthusiastically.

“Clams and fish.”

“Favorite color?”

“Hm… from the way he dresses, black.”

Illuso pries further just to see how deep Prosciutto is both in love and spacing out. “Where is he from?”

“The Pacific Ocean.”

He might be a Pacific islander is what Prosciutto probably means. “Any hobbies?”

“Hm… taking baths, chewing on things and solving puzzles for food.”

“Uh… ok,” That’s a little strange, a big muscle man teething on things like a baby, “What’s your most favorite thing about him?”

Prosciutto pauses to ponder. “It would most definitely be his sincerity, willingness to learn and… his genuine effort trying to get me to like him back.”

“Awww! Now… what’s your least favorite thing about him?”

“He sheds his scales sometimes and his tail knocks things over a lot.” The blond responds without a second thought.

“...what?”

“What?”  
____________

“Look, I promise Risotto’s not bad at all!” Prosciutto tries convincing a doubtful Illuso as they walk back to his house, “He hasn’t ever tried to hurt me. Ever!”

“Prosciutto, I don’t doubt you on that, because octopus-dragon-human things can’t hurt you anyway. You know why? They’re not real, estupido.” Illuso responds sarcastically.

“Risotto is real!” Prosciutto truthfully denies.

“You’re being delusional.”

“Your _name_ is delusion!”

“...I can’t think of a way to defend myself.” Illuso pouts. Prosciutto laughs.

The two fall into silence and eventually make it back to Prosciutto’s house late in the afternoon. Before opening the door, “Just… don’t freak out when you see him ok?” He turns the door knob, not realizing it’s already unlocked.

“If you say so.”

Prosciutto swings open the door. He’s expecting Risotto happily greeting him— but what’s in front of him instead has him bamboozled.

It’s one thing seeing Risotto, but it’s another thing seeing Melone sitting on the couch, painting Risotto’s claws with nail polish and Ghiaccio eating ice cream chatting with him.

“...what is going on.” Prosciutto asks slowly and carefully.

“Oh!” Melone perks up, “You’re back, Prosciutto!” He chuckles nervously. 

“What are you two doing in my house!? Risotto! Did you let them in!?” The blond scolds.

“They were in your room when I woke up.” The goth octopus answers. Illuso, upon seeing Risotto in disbelief, sits on the other couch and promptly passes out.

“WHAT!?”

“I can explain!” Melone quickly says after painting Risotto’s pinkie claw a wicked hipster shade of pink.

“WE BROKE INTO YOUR HOUSE AND ONE THING LED TO ANOTHER SO HERE WE ARE WITH YOUR PET OCTOPUS.” Ghiaccio explains for him with a mouthful of mint chocolate chip ice cream.

“HE’S NOT MY PET, BUT MORE IMPORTANTLY WHY DID YOU TWO BREAK INTO MY FUCKING HOUSE!?” Prosciutto yells, ready to take off his prosthetic and yeet it at them.

“THERE WAS A FUCKING DISEMBODIED TENTACLE WITH MELONE’S FERRETS!?” Ghiaccio yells back, “SO WE DECIDED TO INVESTIGATE, THEN WE MET RISOTTO. THERE WAS SCREAMING AND SHIT BUT STUFF HAPPENED AND NOW WE’RE FRIENDS. HE’S PRETTY FUCKING COOL.”

The blond buries his face in his hands. “I have a lot to explain, don’t I?”

“YEA. YOU FUCKING DO.”

“Prosciutto,” Risotto speaks up, “Your human friends are very nice. They painted my claws. Do you like them?” He holds up his hands for Prosciutto to see.

“You look amazing, Risotto.” Prosciutto says lovingly and supportingly.

Melone looks back at Risotto, then to Prosciutto putting the pieces together. “How did you end up with an octopus for a boyfriend anyway?”

“He’s not my boyfriend!” Prosciutto lies straight through his teeth.

“I am not your boyfriend?” The octopus says with puppy eyes.

“I mean— I didn’t mean it like that, Risotto!”

“I know.” He chuckles deeply. Prosciutto’s face goes cherry red.

Melone wiggles his eyebrows. “Why don’t you start from square one, I’d love to hear this take on _The Shape of Water~_ ”

There’s no running now. Prosciutto gives in and sits on the other couch with the passed out Illuso, “Fine. I’ll tell you everything,” he grumbles.

“Oh goodie~!!”

And with that, Risotto comes over and sits next to him. He tucks his wing around Prosciutto and makes a happy noise when the blond gets comfortable and leans on his shoulder.

Prosciutto smiles. “It all started when Pesci took me out fishing…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I could literally end the fic here. But I won’t


	12. Scarlet Begonias

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Risotto learns how to dance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do not sue me for exploding your hearts

It’s been a long day. Not only did Risotto Nero get a kiss from the human he’s fallen mantle-over-clawed-heels for, he met more interesting humans that are Prosciutto’s friends. Upon waking up, he met Melone who is a strange, lanky and pale-skinned man with a funny accent and weirdly colored hair, and Ghiaccio, a man with a temper as short as himself with a more yellowish-tone to his skin and curly, blue hair that reminds him of the sea’s waves. 

They were frightened of him, but they soon got over their fears. They talked for the time Prosciutto was out for lunch with the man with several pigtails. Many subjects were covered and he learned much:

1.) Apparently humans are able to correct damaged vision by grinding lenses. These are then mounted on frames and made into ‘glasses’. This is what Ghiaccio wears.

2.) They cannot, however, make functioning prosthetic eyes like they can with limbs. Melone wears a glass eye beneath his eyepatch anyway.

3.) Melone has a funny accent because he is from a country (an area of land defined by a human-made border and government) called France. All countries have a sort of native accent.

4.) Some humans have an obsession for sexualizing cephalopod arms. Well, there _is_ the fact that male cephalopods have a modified arm for depositing sperm called the _hectocotylus,_ but the direct spawn of Cthulhu do not.

5.) Ghiaccio told him of a ‘webcomic’ called ‘Homestuck’ and that he should read it otherwise he is an ‘uncultured swine’. Risotto Nero is very much illiterate to the English language, however. He is also not a swine.

6.) The ferrets from the other day are in fact not poisonous at all. He dropped his tentacle for nothing. They’re covered in hairs, and all animals classified as mammals are as well. Including humans.

7.) According to Ghiaccio, many humans are uncultured swine and whores for believing Venezia is pronounced Venice. 

8.) Sharks are feared by humans because of ‘motion pictures,’ or ‘movies’. Risotto Nero strongly disagrees that sharks are the most terrifying ocean creatures. That title certainly belongs to carnivorous cetaceans, with their echolocation and coordinated teamwork.

9.) Prosciutto has actually been yearning to be in a committed relationship for a while now, it’s just that nobody wanted to deal with his physical disability or his bitchy and defensive attitude. And (according to Melone) he has a lot of internalized, emotional baggage. And he’s kind of a perfectionist. And he has high standards. Those high standards are: to be understanding of him and willing to listen/help. That doesn’t seem too hard to Risotto.

10.) Prosciutto is a bottom due to the alignment of the stars at the time he was born (again, according to Melone). Of course, Risotto is the star-spawn of Cthulhu so he _should_ have known this.

All of this new information tumbles around in Risotto’s head. It is a lot to process and it is making him sleepy, along with everything that happened earlier in the day. It is also hard to stay awake with Prosciutto on his shoulder and his _sweet_ voice telling his human friends the story of how they met.

Not much is quite registering in his head. Prosciutto’s body is warm and comfortable leaning against him, Melone is reacting to their story here and there with ‘aaawww!’ and ‘oh my~!’ while Ghiaccio sits there quietly. And the pigtailed man named Illuso woke up in the middle of the conversation, casting side looks of disbelief at Risotto. 

Humans are interesting creatures, Risotto notes to himself.

Maybe he fell asleep or went too deep into thought while Prosciutto was talking— upon feeling a gentle shake on his broad shoulder he sees that Prosciutto’s human friends are gone, and the afternoon’s bright sunlight no longer filters through the curtains. It has been replaced by the evening’s warm oranges and yellows.

“Risotto. Risotto!” Prosciutto jostles him a little harder this time.

“Mm…?”

“Your wing is wrapped around me and I need to go pee.”

“Oh! My apologies, Prosciutto.” Risotto shuffles off of the couch and releases the blond from his iron grip of death.

“Thank you.” Prosciutto gives him a single affectionate pat on his dumb hat and promptly walks upstairs to the bathroom. Risotto lies down upon his departure and shuts his eyes ready to go back to sleep.

A few minutes later Prosciutto strolls out of the bathroom, seeing the sleepy octopus curled up on the couch, “Risotto?” He calls his name standing at the top of the staircase.

“Mhm?”

The blond physically braces himself asking his question: “Do you want to sleep on my bed instead of on the couch tonight?”

One second Risotto is laying passively on the cushions, the next there’s a black and white flash that nearly fucking knocks Prosciutto over and the sound of a giant octopus monster crashing into a mattress. He swears he saw Risotto fly across the hallway.

“Thank you, Prosciutto!” Risotto chirps happily and tucks himself under the blankets. 

Prosciutto sticks his head into the bedroom doorway, “You almost knocked me over, you…!” The blond bites his tongue from saying anything too insulting, “Squishy… goth octopus.”

“I am sorry,” Risotto doesn’t sound terribly guilty, “I got excited. I like your bed very much.” Prosciutto can see and hear his long tail thumping against the mattress from beneath the blanket.

“Yea yea I know you like my bed.” And with that remark, Prosciutto closes the door and disappears down the hall back downstairs.

“...Wait, where are you going? Prosciutto??” He calls out, but to no answer. 

Risotto doesn’t hear the front door open and close, so Prosciutto didn’t leave the house. He waits a couple of minutes for him to come back. Then another few. Then several more. With every passing minute he grows more impatient. Finally, he reluctantly drags himself out of the sweet and warm comfort of the bed.

Coming down the stairs with his toe claws tapping on the hardwood (he doesn’t bother walking silently anymore, it’s a lot of effort considering his weight) he hears… talking. Melodious talking? Someone is speaking but it’s not Prosciutto.

Now that he’s closer to the kitchen, Prosciutto _is_ talking. But it’s sync with the other person’s voice. How can one have a conversation if both are speaking at the same time…?

He glances to the kitchen where the voices are drifting about the air. Sounds that are unfamiliar to his statocyst register and they’re rather pleasant, but he can’t find the words to describe them… but he _can_ describe Prosciutto’s voice. 

There’s a box with many buttons on the kitchen counter— oh, that’s where the unfamiliar pleasant noises are coming from. The blond is swaying with a wooden broom, almost doing a graceful dance with it despite his leg as he swept away at the crumbs on the floor. He sings along quietly but passionately:

 _“She had rings on her fingers and bells on her shoes,~”_ A spin with the broom, “And I knew without askin’ she was into the blues~!” He steps on the base of a dustpan and brushes the crumbs into it.

He sounds like a siren. An alluring, handsome one that steals hearts from Eldritch monsters.

 _“She wore scarlet begonias tucked into her curls,”_ Prosciutto picks up the dustpan and dumps away the debris into the trash bin, _“I knew right away she was not like other girls, other girls…”_ His voice trails off upon noticing Risotto standing there in the doorway.

“...Hello, Prosciutto.” Risotto pipes up, enamoured.

“...Hey… Risotto.” Prosciutto awkwardly says. He puts the broom aside and taps a button on the box. The music stops.

Risotto’s tail sways low to the floor. “What is that?”

Prosciutto avoids eye contact with the R’lyehian, “It’s, uh, it’s called a radio. It plays music,” he presses another button on the radio, and a flat circular object ejects out of a narrow slit, “And this is a CD.”

“Oh?”

“This CD contains the album _From The Mars Hotel_ by the band _The Grateful Dead_ , and they make songs which is what you were hearing,” the blond smiles lightly while still looking off to the side, “They’re my favorite band to listen to.”

“I see…” Risotto tilts his head, “And what were you doing with the broom?”

“I—” He coughs and slides the CD back into the radio to buy himself more time, “I was dancing. To the music. That’s what humans do.”

“With a broom…? Brooms are not sentient. Right?” Risotto pries.

“...Yea. Traditionally, dancing is done with a partner.” Confirms Prosciutto. He glances back at Risotto and finally makes eye contact with the deep crimson red, if only for a moment.

Risotto, an opportunist as both creature-surviving-in-the-sea and total-dumbass-in-love, sees an opportunity. And no way in the name of R’lyeh is he going to miss it. 

“I am unfamiliar with the concept of dancing,” total bullshit by the way, he’s seen pairs of sea dragons and albatrosses do their mating dances, “Would you mind teaching me?” Risotto knows he wishes to be honest with Prosciutto, but he’s gotta do what an octopus in love’s gotta do. 

“Uh…” Prosciutto opens his mouth to speak but the words cling to his tongue and his reddening cheeks.

“Please?” Risotto, pushing it further, unleashes his ultimate weapon: His puppy eyes.

The blond seems to consider every life choice he’s made over his 27 years of living and finally, takes Risotto by the scaly wrist and whisks him into the kitchen. A surprised noise escapes from his beak.

“I’ll teach you how to do a basic waltz, ok? Nice and simple.” Prosciutto says, holding Risotto’s left hand with his right. With his other hand, he traces from his broad shoulder all the way down his arm, and guides his right hand around his waist. The octopus’s eyes flutter shut at the contact.

They snap back open at the clicking sound of the radio’s play button being pressed, and soft guitar strums with drums and light piano begin to sing. 

“Hey! Pay attention, Risotto.” The blond chuckles and gives the painted pink clawed hand he’s holding a squeeze. It’s a little awkward with the slight webbing between his fingers.

“Ok.” He looks down at their feet and keeps his wings and tail tucked close to his body.

“Follow my lead,” Prosciutto takes a step to the side, “Right foot first, then your left comes together with it…” 

“Like this?” Risotto mimics his movement with clumsy coordination, trying his best not to accidentally step on him. He doesn’t want to hurt him.

“Good! You’re doing good Risotto,” The Italian praises him with a rub on his shoulder, “Now your right foot goes back… and take your left foot and step across.”

“Across…? Like so?” The perplexed octopus follows the steps carefully and nearly fucking trips. But he’s getting it.

“Uh huh. Then bring your right foot together with your left…” He guides Risotto through patiently, “And step forward, rinse, and repeat. Easy, just six steps!”

“Rinse what?”

Prosciutto barks a laugh at that. “It’s another figure of speech!” 

“Ah. I should have figured that out.” Risotto chuckles a bit and his own awkwardness.

“It’s alright,” The blond flashes a grin,  
“Now are you ready for the hard part?”

Risotto’s eyes widen and look up at Prosciutto. “It gets harder?”

“It’s not that bad, I promise! All you have to do is remember the steps, spin me here and there and look at me instead of our feet.”

Ok— that is very challenging for Risotto Nero. Not the memorization or the spinning, but keeping eye contact for longer than ten seconds without getting flustered. He is starting to regret this.

“Hey,” the hand on his shoulder moves to his cheek, “Look at me, Risotto.”

“Uh…” Risotto’s breath hitches.

The blond’s expression falters. “Do you want to stop?”

“...No. No I do not wish to stop, Prosciutto.” Mustering his courage, he pulls the blond closer with his scaly arm that’s around his waist and starts them off again.

“Oh! Then lead away, Risotto.” Prosciutto finds his hand back firmly on his shoulder.

Risotto’s steps remain somewhat clunky and stiff because he’s _so_ concentrated in doing this right for Prosciutto. _One step, two step, three step. Then four step, five step, six step._ His brow furrows repeating this in his head, dead set on getting it perfected.

“Risotto,” Prosciutto gives his clawed hand a gentle squeeze to grab his attention, “Relax. Don’t think about, go with the flow. It’ll come naturally to you.”

“Huh?” Risotto grunts and tries his best to guide Prosciutto into a spin.

Prosciutto thinks, trying to word his instructions in a way that would make sense to him. “Think of dancing… like seaweed flowing in the currents or something ocean-y. I don’t know.” 

“Ah. That makes sense.” The tension in Risotto’s figure fades away and like that, he’s moving with Prosciutto as smoothly as silk.

“!!! You’re doing so well, Risotto.” Prosciutto smiles widely because he’s damn proud of Risotto and himself.

Risotto‘s expression is beyond happy and the blond can see that. “Thank you, Prosciutto.” 

“I only speak the truth, Risotto.” Prosciutto moves himself closer to him. Their bodies are almost touching.

Looking into Prosciutto’s eyes, though he thought it would be difficult, isn’t that bad considering how at ease his gaze makes Risotto feel. Truly, they are beautiful along with every edge and curve of Prosciutto’s body. They are alluring. _He’s_ alluring. Absolutely nothing could distract out of his thoughts—

 _”Do it. Do it. Do it.”_ Great Grandfather Cthulhu’s calls echo in his mind and quickly fade away.

Risotto takes deep breath, lifts a tentacle and quickly lays a sucker on Prosciutto’s smile. 

“...Oh. Uh...” Prosciutto gasps. 

“Are you alright, Prosciutto?” The octopus fears he’s taken it too far.

“I-I just wasn’t expecting that, that’s all!” He laughs breathlessly and gingerly holds Risotto’s cheek. 

“Really?” He flusteredly chokes out.

“Mhm,” Prosciutto stands on his tippy-toes to plant a kiss on his squishy face, “You never cease to surprise me, do you know that?”

Risotto coughs. He’s not actually coughing, he’s just mimicking the sound. “I knew that.”

Prosciutto laughs. That goddamned angelic laugh. “Cmon, keep dancing with me.” 

“Do… you like dancing with me?”

“Of course I do!” Prosciutto sighs deeply and rests his head on Risotto’s wide chest, “...I like you, after all.”

It takes all of Risotto’s muscles and willpower to stop his tail from wreaking havoc in the kitchen. “I like you too, Prosciutto.”

The dancing pair continue to sway together with the soft music in the air. No other sounds fill the kitchen, other than their breathing and the tapping of their footsteps. It’s… peaceful and comforting for both. Having Prosciutto’s head nodding in his chest and his arm around his slim frame and _knowing_ for _certain_ Prosciutto has grown to like him, to Risotto, is the loveliest feeling in the cosmos. He wouldn’t trade it for anything else.

“Prosciutto,” Risotto drums his clawed fingers gingerly along the side of his waist, “Do you remember the day we first met?”

“The day I almost had a heart attack and you ate all our clams?” The Italian hums into his chest.

The goth rumbles a low chuckle. “Yes. Do you remember what I said to you in R’lyehian?”

“Nope. It’s all gibberish to me.”

“Y' ymg' mgah'n'ghft og c’te, shuggoth,” Risotto hugs his waist and holds him closer, “I find you very cute, human.”

“Oh?” Prosciutto looks up at his face, “You always thought I’m attractive?”

“You... are the most beautiful being I have ever laid my eyes on, out of all I have seen traveling this world. And I like your feisty attitude.” The taller individual cranes himself down and smiles when Prosciutto stands on his tippy toes again for their foreheads to touch.

“You know what, Risotto? I admire your strive to learn. It’s adorable.” The blond smiles and presses a chaste kiss to his cheek.

“You are adorable too.”

“Mm, thank you.” Prosciutto mumbles into his shoulder, still swaying with the music. Risotto finds his own head leaning against Prosciutto’s as the two embraced in their slow dance.

They bask in each other’s company for another moment’s time, until Prosciutto taps his shoulder. “Hey, I’m getting a little tired now. My leg’s killing me.”

“Would you like to go to bed?”

Prosciutto slips both of his hands around Risotto’s shoulders. “Carry me.”

“Ok.” Risotto obliges to his request, and off they go upstairs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I COULD ALSO END THE FIC HERE BUT I AIN’T GONNA—
> 
> Edit: It feels too perfect of an ending so I’ll mark this fic as complete...


	13. CUTE BLOND TWINK SMASHED BY ELDRITCH MONSTER! MUST WATCH HOT SEX ACTION

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tags: Anal sex, nonhuman genitalia, blow jobs, tentacles, fucking horny Prosciutto, daddy kink, heat cycles 
> 
> Read at your own risk!1!!!

It’s been a several months since Risotto Nero has met Prosciutto. He’s madly in love, that’s for sure. And it’s a great thing Prosciutto loves him back. Their relationship is very close now, from snuggling to kisses to cooking together…

But they haven’t had sex yet.

Ok, here’s the deal: The sexual tension is high between the two (Risotto is attracted to Prosciutto’s slim frame and round ass, Prosciutto really wants to touch his muscles and suck his dick (if he has one, hypothetically speaking)) but there are a few obstacles in the way.

One, Risotto has no idea how to bring up the topic of sex.

Two, Prosciutto doesn’t want to bring it up in fear of God striking him dead for fucking a monster.

Three, Risotto actually HAS a dick, but fears he’s too big for Prosciutto’s sweet and tight Italian ass.

Four, Prosciutto has never had sex with another human being. In other words: A virgin. Risotto knows this.

This wall of problems crumble like they were nothing one day, on a fateful spring day… MATING SEASON.

Risotto wakes up that morning feeling an awful lot of horniness accumulating in his groin. It’s all too familiar. He is in heat. In R’lyeh, all the other spawn must be having an awesome orgy at the moment.

He blinks awake and, seeing the ENORMOUS throbbing bulge in his pants, knows he must take care of his morning wood. But what he’s not expecting is Prosciutto sitting at the end of the bed.

“Mm…,, I’ve always wanted to drink your tasty octo cummies, my sexy goth daddy..,..,,. UwU” Prosciutto purrs, staring at the bulge like a hungry furry from 2008.

Risotto knows what the fuck is about to go down, and he’s too horny to realize how weird Prosciutto is being.

“Can I have your octo cummies swimming in my wittle anus, pwease? XD” The horny blond bitch nuzzles his cheek on the bulge like, again, a hungry and cringeworthy furry roleplayer on DeviantArt.

“Go ahead you fucking dirty slut. You want daddy’s cummies in your horny ass?” Risotto grunts, despite his lack of a daddy kink. He is personally more of a master/slave play kind of Lovecraftian being.

“Mmm uwu I really really really want them!!1!!” Prosciutto unbuckles Risotto’s stupid Hot Topic pants and out comes not one, but TWO foot-long Eldritch cocks, one above the other, striped black and white just like their owner. They’re spurting with little octo cummies like a mini fountain already.

“Drink up, bitch.” 

“Yes daddy!!!!!!!!!!” Prosciutto wiggles his uwu twink butt and laps up one of the dick’s cummies like a dog.

“Yea you like that? You like my fucking dicks?” Risotto grumbles. He has no idea why he’s saying this.

“Mmmmmm..,.,, I can feel daddy’s cummies swimming in my mouth!!1!” Prosciutto says clearly, somehow, with a mouthful of Lovecraftian penis like a dubbed hentai girl. He bobs his head up and down, taking in that calamari-flavored dick. He strokes Risotto’s other penis, just fucking SLATHERING it in his own cummies.

Risotto bathes in this oral attention he’s getting, but staring at Prosciutto’s ahegao dick-sucking face and his uwu twink ass takes him to a whole new level of horny. Oh, and Prosciutto is suddenly naked now.

“Do you want to take my octopus cocks into your tight hole now? Huh?” The goth octopus jabs at his horny uwu bitch.

“SHOVE YOUR OCTO PENISES INTO MY SLUTTY BOTTOM HORNY HOLE, GOTH DADDY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!jdjdn”

Risotto uses his thique tail to flip Prosciutto like a pancake (he spins like, a whole 180° in the air) so he’s now on his hands and knees facing away from Risotto.

“Is daddy gonna fuck my puckered wittle ass hole now owo???” The blond bitch baby shakes his ass in Risotto’s face, those ass cheeks clappin’ like Solid Snake’s.

“Yes, Daddy is going to fuck You now.” Risotto can feel great grandfather Cthulhu shaking his head in shame. Without a moment’s hesitation, the octopus clings to Prosciutto’s hips and slides his upper dick dripping with cum and saliva into Prosciutto’s butt. His lower dick rubs against Prosciutto’s human penis.

“OH MY GOD! GOTH DADDY’S PHALLUS IS STRETCHING ME OUT SO GOOD~~~~~!!!!!!!!!!!!! >w

[I... I can’t keep writing this. I’m losing so many brain cells.]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> April Fools I fucking guess
> 
>  
> 
> **  
> **  
> **_This chapter is not canon in this fic and never actually happened._**  
> 


	14. Divine Eldritch Intervention II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s Cthulhu, again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hgh I’m BACK BABY

_Risotto blinks awake, floating above the dark abyss where R’lyeh lies sleeping. He must be dreaming again. Perhaps Great Grandfather Cthulhu wishes to see him again?_

_He swishes his tail back and forth in waves like a sea snake, and glides through the water on his wings— are they fully healed now from the net incident? Pesci deserves many more blessings._

_Again, he arrives at the grand stone doors to his Grandfather’s home. With a gentle tap of his claws that are still painted pink, they slide open with massive clouds of sediment drifting from the action. He lands on his feet and steps into the murky corridors._

_Cthulhu’s awaiting at the end in his eternally dark chamber, his luminous red eyes trailing after Risotto as he approaches._

_Risotto simply bows instead of kneeling down like last time, well aware of his grandfather’s somewhat casual nature with Risotto in particular. “ Hello, great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather Cthulhu.”_

_“Good evening, my great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandson.” An enormous but somewhat wrinkly tentacle reaches out from the murky depths, inviting his grandson closer. Risotto obliges, and politely sits in the chamber before the mighty Eldritch god._

_“Why have you brought me here today?” He asks._

_“It is about the human you are courting,” Cthulhu starts, “I wish to congratulate you on winning his heart. A long and perilous journey of hardships that not many of our kind could carry through.”_

_“Really!? Thank you!” Risotto’s tail wags so vigorously he accidentally propels himself forward._

_“Settle down, grandson!” Cthulhu bellows with chuckles. A large but gentle tentacle wraps around him and plants him to the floor, “I am not done speaking with you yet.”_

_“Oh?” The striped R’lyehian settles himself down into Cthulhu’s embrace, propping his arms up on top of the squishy tentacle and hugging it like a stuffed animal._

_“That is correct. There is much we must discuss.”_

_“Like… what?” Risotto tilts his head._

_“We must plan the wedding, of course! You two are a couple now, yes? After all, you are sharing a bed with him right now.” Through the darkness, Risotto can see Cthulhu’s own tail sway like a dog’s._

_“The wedding!?” Risotto squeaks out, feeling his scales going red. He’s not ready yet!_

_“Yes!” Grandfather Cthulhu squeaks back excitedly._

_“W-We… have never discussed being official, but I would assume that we are indeed a couple since we kissed and did our courtship dance...”_

_“Good, good. Now, first we must gather the blood sacrifices for the pact…”_

_“Grandfather, if I may,” Risotto boldly interrupts, “I do not think Prosciutto is the kind to… like blood sacrifices at a wedding.”_

_“Oh. That is a shame. What about serving the finest, most extravagant delicacies of R’lyeh? I am sure they would be to his palette.”_

_“With all due respect, I do not believe Prosciutto would be a fan of eating shark organs and whale bones either.”_

_“But they are good! How could he not like them?” Cthulhu sounds slightly offended._

_“Because… humans do not eat that sort of food,” he thinks, “They like eating pasta.”_

_“What the fuck is a pasta?”_

_Risotto recalls their time together in the kitchen. “It is flour mixed with egg and butter to make noodles, then boiled to cook through._

_“...noodles?”_

_“They are shaped like eels. Little baby eels. Sometimes they are also shaped like seaweeds or bullhead shark eggs.”_

_“And humans eat that?”_

_“Correct.”_

_“Hmph… even gods can learn something new every day…”_

_And even The Great Old Ones can get distracted with the natural flow of conversation.  
____________

_Prosciutto opens his eyes in an unfortunately familiar dreamscape. The dark cold waters, the strange glowing green and the alien architecture of the underwater city._

_Not fucking again._

_He pinches himself to try and wake up before the cryptic chanting starts, but to no avail. He pinches harder, and still nothing._

_Fuck._

_He screams out loud, and all that answers is his dreaded echo. Then all of a sudden, it’s the same current as before, but THIS time it’s pulling him DOWN. To the depths of death._

_“FUCK! FUCK! FUCK FUCK **FUCK** FUCK FUCK—” Prosciutto flails his limbs trying excruciatingly hard to outswim the current, before quickly tiring out because this man has only 15% muscle on him. He gives up and lets the water carry him deeper and deeper into the abyss._

_He takes a deep breath— the dream feels so real but he can still breathe, fucking wack— as he’s pulled towards two mighty grand stone doors that grumble open once he’s come close. Looking down the corridors he sees nothing but murky darkness._

_The current pulls him to the stone floor of a shadowy chamber, blanketed with a thin layer of sediment and… are those Risotto’s footprints?_

_Prosciutto manages to get on his feet and brush himself off. He peers up into the darkness— “JESUS FUCKING CHRIST!” He shrieks upon seeing two giant, glowing crimson eyes peering down at his frail mortal self._

_The pair of eyes lower down, observing Prosciutto with an almost slight curiosity in them, the same look in Risotto’s as he watches Prosciutto cook and clean. Now that the looming figure is closer, the frightened man can make out the details: A vaguely humanoid body squatting evilly, rubbery olive-green scales, narrow wings and of course, the head of a disfigured octopus. Basically, a gargantuan but not sexy or cute version of Risotto._

_“W...WHO THE FUCK? WHAT THE FUCK?” Prosciutto tries to turn around and swim away, but the water seems to come to a standstill around him._

_“Y’ ah Cthulhu. Throdog r'luhhor ng gnaiih ot Risotto.” A voice deeper than the Mariana Trench speaks and the entire chamber reverberates._

_“WHAT THE FUCK WHAT ARE YOU EVEN SAYING PLEASE GOD SAVE ME I SWEAR I’LL GO TO CHURCH—” Prosciutto starts sobbing in fear._

_“...Oh. Forgive me human, I forget I am speaking my native tongue on occasion,” The figure clears its throat, “I am Cthulhu. Great Old One and great grandfather of Risotto.”_

_Fucking great._

_Prosciutto’s eyes widen, still full of tears. “You… You are his grandfather?” Oh, that totally makes fucking sense._

_“That is correct. You are here because I wish to speak with you, human.”_

_“Why…?”_

_“It is about my grandson.”_

_“What about him?” Prosciutto swallows nervously, still freaking out._

_“I wish to thank you for giving him the romantic attention he needs. Truly, he loves you.”_

_Prosciutto starts to not freak out._

_“However,” Cthulhu stops his happy thoughts, “As his great grandfather it is my duty to review you and make sure you are the perfect mate for him. In other words, if you are good enough for Risotto. He deserves the absolute best.”_

_Prosciutto starts freaking out again._

_“Luckily for you, pitiful mortal, my only standard for my grandson is someone who brings joy in his life. And you… you do just that.”_

_Prosciutto stops freaking out again._

_“HOWEVER,” Cthulhu seems to enjoy this twisted game, “There is much you still need to know about providing the best care for my grandson, now that you two are… a thing now.”_

_“Okay…” Prosciutto mumbles, clenching all his muscles in effort to not shit himself in front of an eldritch being that really shouldn’t exist._

_“One,” the beast begins, “Feed him only the freshest of seafood. His favorite food is actually crabs, not fish. He is fond of the crunch the shell gives. Two, brush his scales. Groom him. P a m p e r him from his mantle to the tip of his tail. Get rid of the dead scales. Three, feed him knowledge. Lots of it,” Cthulhu thinks for a moment, “though, I am sure you could have figured most of this out on your own.”_

_“Uh, yea.” Fearing for his life, Prosciutto takes mental note of all this information._

_Cthulhu’s eyes remain fixated on the shaking human. Looking at him up and down, judging every inch of his mortal shell, “If you do not treat him as such from here on out or even THINK to break his heart, you will receive the most despairing of consequences,” Tentacles in the blackness writhe threateningly._

_“A-Are you going to kill me if I do?”_

_“Oh no. I will not kill you.”_

_“Phew—“_

_“Instead, you will be driven to madness by nightmares and elder beings tormenting you for ages. And you shall die by your own hand. Violently and gruesomely.”_

_“...WHAT!?”_

_Before Prosciutto can ask any more questions, the same current of water pushes him out of the deep corridors, and the world around him fades away to reality…_

“AH!” Prosciutto jolts awake on his bed, skin in an ice cold sweat and heartbeat running a bit too high. He flails his arms for something to hug, grabbing onto a warm, scaly waist.

“Prosciutto…?” The monster in his bed mumbles and cracks his eyes open, “Are you ok?”

“I don’t wanna die. I’m too young and pretty to die.” The blond whispers into his chest.

“Yes, you are young and pretty.” Confused at this sudden outburst, Risotto settles his fingers on the small of the shaking man’s back.

“Thanks, Risotto,” Prosciutto looks up at the R’lyehian, sniffling and wiping his puffy eyes. “Your… your favorite food is crabs, right?”

Risotto blinks at this sudden change in subject. “How did you know? Yes they are indeed extravagant in both flavor and crunch—”

“It’s morning so Pesci must’ve came home last night and he’s gonna leave again soon.” Prosciutto scrambles off of the bed, nearly forgetting that his prosthetic isn’t on his right leg. He grabs it from the bedside, straps it into place and still manages to trip on himself.

Risotto tilts his head and blinks again. “Why are you in such a hurry?”

“I DON’T WANT TO DIE!” The panicking man hobbles into the hallway and bumps into his little brother, all dressed and ready for another day of fishing.

Pesci makes a surprised noise. “Fra! You’re never up this early!” He looks over his Fra’s shoulder, “Hey, did you finally make the move on Risotto—!”

“NO TIME FOR EXPLAINING THAT!” Prosciutto snags Pesci’s collar and drags him down the stairs.

“!?!? What’s with you, Fra!?” Pesci looks just as confused as Risotto.

“We gotta catch some crabs, Pesci! LOTS OF CRABS!”

“Slow down, Fra!!”

Risotto hears the front door open and shut. Perplexed at Prosciutto and hungry at the thought of crustaceans, he drags himself to the kitchen to fix himself a human-style breakfast.  
__________

Her Majesty: The Ocean rocks her waves against the boat, making it bob up and down rhythmically. Prosciutto, still in his pajamas, clings to the boat’s railings while Pesci drops in the same net that snagged Risotto.

“How does a skilled fisherman catch a crab, Pesci?” Prosciutto asks, seasick.

“You just throw in a crab trap with bait and wait!” The pineapple man does just that, tossing a cage on a rope into the water. 

“Oh.” Prosciutto says, thoroughly unimpressed.

Pesci takes a seat on the dock, near his older brother. They don’t talk for a while, with Pesci relaxing to the sound of water and gulls, and Prosciutto feeling somewhat nauseous.

The younger brother breaks the silence first. “So… Prosciutto.”

“Yes?” 

He pauses like he’s making a choice in a Telltale game. He wiggles his brows a bit, “How did you get Risotto in your bed?” 

Prosciutto coughs, mentally debating whether his little brother should know or not. “Long story short, we danced together and then we kissed and then we slept together.”

Pesci almost screams. “That’s so cute!”

“Shut up!” The blond sputters out, blushing.

“No! That’s the most adorable mental image ever! You, in his big strong embrace, swaying together to romantic music… and then kissing! My big bro’s in loooooove~!” Pesci teases like any little brother.

“It wasn’t ROMANTIC music! It was The Grateful Dead!” Prosciutto banters back.

“Even better! You dancing with him to your favorite band!! Your heart must’ve been fluttering!!! Oh my goodness I wish you had it on tape!!!!”

 _The waves of the big blue look very tempting to drown in at the moment_ , Prosciutto thinks to himself.

“Hey Fra, did you do anything else after that? Like… you know?” Pesci winks.

“No, Pesci. We did NOT have sex.” He shoots a glare at him.

“Aw.”

“What do you mean, ‘Aw’!?”

“I’m just disappointed. You did seem to like his chest a lot.”

Prosciutto desperately tries to change the subject. He tears at his mind, trying to think of anything. ANYTHING!

However, Pesci notices his discomfort first. “Say, why did you want to catch some crabs? Did you finally get over your kabourophobia?” 

Prosciutto sighs. “I’m still scared shitless of them in particular, but I was told that they’re Risotto’s favorite food.”

“Aaaaw!” Not quite questioning who told him that, “You really love him that much that you’d go out of your way to get him his favorite snack! Even though you’re still scared of them! How romantic!”

“Yea…” Prosciutto doesn’t have the heart to tell his little brother that he was basically threatened by an Eldritch God who happens to be his love’s great grandfather into doing this.

Hours later into the afternoon, Pesci pulls up the net loaded with fishies and sorts them out, tasking Prosciutto to reel in the crab catch.

He hauls the trap onto the dock: a simple cage with a hole on one side of it. Inside: a dead fish for bait and several moderately sized crabs. 

“Wow, Fra!” Pesci jumps up and down uncontrollably, “That’s a lot!”

“Ugh, yea. I hope Risotto eats them all.” Prosciutto places the cage down, disgusted at the crawling decapods.

“Now you gotta put them in here!” Pesci holds out a large plastic bucket.

“...with my bare hands?”

“We got you over baby sharks and squid, so this is the next step!”

“Fuck that!” Prosciutto practically spits, sneering at the waving pinchers.

“You wanna feed Risotto? Give him the tastiest food and make him happy? Have his love for you increase? You gotta do it, Fra!” Pesci opens the lid to the trap.

“...You know what! Fine! I’m not a damn coward anymore! I’m going to pick up the living shit out of these crabs!” The blond cracks his knuckles.

“That’s the spirit, Fra!” Pesci smiles big and wide, “Now, what you do is pick up the crab from behind—”

Prosciutto shoots his hand into the trap without thinking, and screams in agony.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> RIP Prosciutto’s beautiful hands


	15. Are You Feelin’ it Now, Mr. Krabs?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Who’s ready for Formaggio!?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m back again

Risotto Nero is in the human house alone, just after Prosciutto left in a panic exclaiming about catching crabs. He had just fixed himself a human-style breakfast (eggs) and settled himself down at the dining table to eat.

He drums his talons on the wooden table as he consumes the eggs, bored out of his mind. _I could possibly knock some things over, deconstruct and reconstruct the puzzle from a few days ago, that will certainly take a few hours, perhaps go for a walk and find a gift for Prosciutto…_

The thoughts bouncing around in his brain are thankfully interrupted, with a knock on the front door. Prosciutto is back already!? Risotto practically flies to the door, with his suckers still clinging to sunny side up eggs. He turns the doorknob with his tail wagging behind him.

Upon opening the door, there is no blond Italian man with his little brother. Instead, there is a short man with dark brown skin, an orange buzzcut and green eyes with an aesthetically pleasing punk red leather jacket. By his side: Illuso.

Risotto was certainly not expecting this.

“I _told_ you I wasn’t on drugs! See?! You owe me 100 lire, puta!” Illuso barks at the shorter man and gestures frantically at the creature of the depths.

“I mean… he’s probably in a sick fursuit or something. I dunno.” He shrugs, pulling colored sheets of paper from his pocket and handing it over to the Hispanic man.

Risotto stares at them unblinkingly, “Who are you, short dark-skinned human?” His tail sways anxiously.

“My name’s Formaggio, I’m a furry too! Nice to meet you.” Formaggio grins and extends his hand out to Risotto.

Risotto looks down at his hand. “What are you offering me in your palm?” _And what in the name of Yog-Sothoth is a furry?_

“Damn, you’re really deep into this roleplay. Uh, you don’t have to keep pretending to not know people stuff. You can shake my hand now.” Formaggio says. Illuso buries his face in his hands out of second-hand embarrassment.

“...?”

“By the way, how the hell are you getting your tail to move like that? I don’t hear any gears turning! And those wings look so damn realistic, how’d you make those?! Also you’ve got like, some egg stuck to your face.” 

Illuso wants to die.

“This… this is not a costume. My name is Risotto Nero and I am a R’lyehian.”

“Hol’ up, so you’re 100% real? All this is real?” To emphasize his point, Formaggio reaches up with his already extended hand and pokes Risotto between the eyes.

He squeaks.

_____________

“So lemme get this straight, you’re the great-to-the-eighteenth-power grandson of an Elder God from space, you swam around the world for the fun of it and ended up here, in Prosciutto’s house, because you got hungry and swam into a fishing net?”

“Yes. I have confirmed this information at least six times within the length of this conversation.” Risotto sits amongst Formaggio and Illuso in the living room. The humans sit on the opposite couch of the one Risotto has claimed as his own with his old scales littered all over it.

Formaggio blinks with wide eyes and a muttered, “Holy motherfucking shit,” leaning back and taking this all in.

Risotto tries to process the literal meaning of ‘Holy motherfucking shit,’ and quickly decides to not. (It is shit that is holy by some means, and it fucks mothers. What the R’lyeh is wrong with human figures of speech?)

The new human speaks up again. “What’s it like living with Prosciutto, Risotto?”

“Ah,” The octopus clears his throat, “He is very pleasant with me and I enjoy his company.”

Formaggio gawks at him. “How the hell did you get the bitch™ to be so nice to you!? You’re not even his lil’ bro Pesci!”

“He’s Prosciutto’s boyfriend.” Illuso bluntly states.

“GDHSJFKSHKDHJSDF WHAT!?” Formaggio wheezes out of disbelief.

“Yes. Prosciutto has taken care of me and I quickly fell for him. Afterwards, he fell for me and returned my affections,” Risotto’s scales go pink, “He taught me much about human lifestyles.”

“The human lifestyles?” Formaggio smirks, “Do tell me how he told you that people should ALWAYS pour the cereal before milk—“

“He probably doesn’t mean THAT, Formaggio!” The pigtailed man smacks him on the shoulder, “He probably taught him dumb domestic things like how to cook.”

“Pouring cereal IS a form of cooking!”

“No it’s not, you idiot!” Illuso banters back.

“It’s preparing food! Therefore! It is cooking!” The shorter man says with great confidence.

Risotto clears his throat to grab the arguing humans’ attention. “If I may interject, Prosciutto did in fact teach me how to cook fish.”

Illuso cockily grins and turns back to Formaggio. “I. Was. Right.”

The octopus monster continues his interjection. “He taught me puzzles and introduced me to this sound called music as well.”

Formaggio cackles out a laugh. “Lemme guess, he only introduced you to his crappy old dad music?”

“Dad music?”

__

“The Grateful Dead!”

“Oh, yes. He said that was the band that performed the music.”

“Well I’ve got news for you, squishy friend!” The ginger leans forward and whispers rather loudly, “There’s _other_ kinds of music that’s way, _way_ better!”

“I have to agree with that statement.” Illuso crosses his arms and huffs.

Risotto tilts his head, very interested in this new idea of more music.

Formaggio’s brow furrows, staring Risotto down. “Just from the way you dress, you look like the kind of guy who’d be into heavy metal.” 

“Uh, if he’s a creature of the deep that’s still learning about humans, don’t you think going from slow rock to heavy metal is a bit of a shock?” Illuso voices his concerns.

“Eh, this guy looks like he can handle it!”

“Do I not have a say in this?” Risotto asks.

“Trust me, you’ll LOVE it!” Formaggio grins from ear to ear and procures a case out of nowhere labeled _Metallica._

____________

“Ow… ow ow ow…” Prosciutto blows on his fingers that are throbbing red from getting pinched by crabs. He and Pesci, with a basketful of crawling food for Risotto, aren’t too far from their shared home.

“I’m sorry, Fra! I tried telling you to be more careful…” Pesci apologizes.

“No, no. _I’m_ sorry for putting you through all that trouble of prying those fucking terrorizing claws off of me.” 

“We’ll ice them your fingers down once we get back inside, ok Fra?”

“Not after I watch these shelled little shits get torn apart by Risotto, Pesci.” The blond fumes and turns to the soulless eyes of the crustaceans.

“Er… I understand your desire for vengeance against the crabs, but…” The younger brother trails off as they get closer to their home.

“But…?” Prosciutto waits for him to finish his sentence.

“Do you hear that, Fra?” 

“Hear what?”

“Loud, blaring metal music?”

Prosciutto looks up at their house, which isn’t too far away. “That sounds like it’s coming from our fucking house.”

The brothers glance at each other for a moment, a silent moment with Prosciutto’s face twitching in confusion and Pesci’s with worry, then fucking sprint to the front door. Prosciutto doesn’t hesitate to slam the door open and nearly send it flying off its poor, abused hinges.

The entire world seems to pause, except for Kirk’s epic guitar solo from _Ride the Lightning._

There is Illuso, quietly sitting on the couch, spectating the event before him.

There is Formaggio, holding up Prosciutto’s radio with the volume to the max, standing in the middle of the living room.

There is now Prosciutto standing in the doorway, with Pesci looking over his head behind him with an armful of crabs. 

Finally, Risotto Nero. His expression is that of a goth teenage boy who was just interrupted from jamming out to heavy metal by his highly conservative Catholic mother.

The cheese man of cheese is the first to react to the brothers’ sudden appearance. “Hey, fellas! Uh, I know this looks bad but I can explain everything—“

Prosciutto holds up a hand to silence him, “Illuso told you about Risotto and you wanted to fuck around with him. Am I right?” He says deadpanned, far too used to people coming into his house without his consent to give a shit at this point.

Formaggio groans and turns the radio off. 

The blond turns to Risotto next, “Risotto, did these two dumbasses bother you at all?” He smiles warmly. 

Illuso scoffs in offense. “Don’t compare me to the likes of a dumba—”

“I was not bothered by them at all. In fact, the one named Formaggio introduced me to a new kind of music that sparks great joy in my heart.” Risotto replies stoically.

Prosciutto exhales deeply out of relief. 

Formaggio opens his dumbass mouth to speak. “Is this the part where you change your mind about kicking us out and letting us stay?”

Pesci pipes up from behind his Fra. “Yea, but you should probably leave? You don’t need to see us feed Risotto crabs!”

“C̴̣͚̝͐ͅŖ̵͈̑A̵̡͉̗̿̓B̷̖̝̽̿̈́S̸̨̺̫̳̒͐̋!̶̬̹͒̀̐̕?̷̭͓̞͐̈́” The spawn of an unholy, eldritch being speaks with cursed jubilance.

“...Yea, uh, I gotta go feed my cats and change my pants.” With that, Formaggio grabs Illuso by his stupid padded leather jacket and yeets the fuck outta that house. 

Pesci grins. “Now that they are gone—”

“P̷̣̬̱͆̚͜I̶̡̖͒̓̈́̈́T̴̛̖̩́̀͝Í̸͖̲̮F̸͚̻̭̍̏͝Ŭ̵̞̖̞͙̿Ḷ̴̑͜ ̶̀̌͘͜͝M̶̭̍̍̆͑O̴̖̟̬̒̏̽R̵͚͖͍̐̓͠T̵͔̱͊Ǎ̷͈L̷͈̐̽̀̈́Ş̴̹̩̏!̴̧̥̖̅̊ ̶̨̥͎̀̑͘͘G̶͈͊͜İ̸̞͎̱V̵̼̫̹̰̂̎̆̄É̸͕̗̠͐̈̋ͅ ̷̼̽M̵̻̼̟͒́̔͝E̷̘̺̫͔͐́͛͝ ̶̼͇̺̆T̵̨͌̊͒̕ͅH̴̘̃̉Ĕ̷̤̘̥̮͒͝ ̴̣̣͈̓̏͠Ś̵̱̲̻͠À̴̲̻͗C̴͙̻̥̬̆̃̒͛R̷̹͒I̸̜̜̥͓͋̒̈́F̸̺̾͜ͅÍ̷͐ͅC̵̛͍̳͈̲̽́͝Ë̸̟̼́̇S̴͓͗ ̸̢̅̉̔͋Ý̸̮̤̊͗Ô̵̠͙̪̹̏͌̈́Ú̴̲̣̞̈́̃͜ ̷̼͉̻͛̔̌́H̵̤̅̓̐A̵̧͚̱͗̆̍V̷͍͚̺̏͊̉E̵͙̦͑ ̸̙̖͑̈́G̴̰͙̏̎̌͠A̴͈͔̽̍̍̕T̴̯̱͐́͠͝H̴̼͊̌͐E̸̠̒͊͗͊R̷͉̓̋̑͠E̶̡̻̦͙͂͆D̶̹̯̣̀͂͝ ̵̱̭́́͘F̶̲̫̈́̾R̷̲̝͒O̸̘͊M̴̢̜̖͋̋ ̴̼̭̇T̷̼͍͗H̵̨̻̙̬̃͌̾Ë̶̩́̽ ̴̖̋́̾͝P̴̤̲̹̋R̶̢̳̓͗͝I̶͇̋̏̅́S̸͇̊͆ͅT̴̼̞̭̳͝I̸̳̠̎̕N̸̩͖̝͍͋͑É̶̠̿̍ ̴̹̇͗ͅͅŚ̶̛͈͆͊E̶̢̮͒̾A̶̲͙̱̅̽Ṡ̷͉̫̩͕ ̷̡̐̔̕F̴̧͕̝̈́͠O̷͈͛͛͗͛R̶̪͔͋͋̅̉ ̶̛̩̐M̸͇̾͋̈̀E̶̛̛̞̙͋.̷̢̠͚̬͗” Risotto hisses out. 

Prosciutto takes the basket of crabs from Pesci and holds it out at arm’s length, unfazed by the cursed energy. And yet, he winces upon touching the basket.

“Ȩ̶͕̈́̂͠X̸̪̊C̴̨̩̳̃̀̐E̸̱̹̖͗̈̄̓L̶̯͙̞̿̌͛͝Ļ̶̭̘͍͌͑E̴͌͋ͅÑ̷̦̭̚T̵̙̳̗̀.̵̭̓͌̽̋ ̸̛̞̫̃̐͝N̶̳̲̝͑́̊Ọ̶̀Ẇ̵̗ ̸̜̝̈̂̈̀I̴̡͉̳̲͌͒ ̸̺̬̱̀́S̷̬̀̂̓H̵̼͐͑̒A̶̙͂L̸͍̮͓̂̽̾͠Ļ̷̭̈̇ ̸̠̔́͋C̴͙̲̥͙͆́O̸̱̰͗N̸̡̄͒̓͗ͅS̷̡̽Ŭ̴̗̜́̐̈́M̵̪͓̏̽E̷̠̗̞͉͑̌̂ ̷̬̓͋̏̚T̷̻͉͔͇̏̃̔́Ḫ̸͉̙͖͐̅Ë̶͍͕̆̔͗͜S̸͙̠̄͊͜E̷̮̺̔̈́̌̉ ̴͚͔̆͜C̴͈̃́̓R̶̜̈̓Ǘ̵͈̱̊̒̔Ş̶̲̩͒̿T̷͈̖̫̎́Ạ̴̀́̕C̵͚̱̆E̴̻̽A̴̹̯̰͛̈́̓NS—Prosciutto, you are hurt.”

“Huh?”

The R’lyehian reaches out to the basket, gingerly settling his hands on Prosciutto’s own, “Your fingers. They are bruised and inflamed,” he notes with worry.

“N-No,” Prosciutto looks off to the side, “Just eat your damned lunch, Risotto.”

“You need to reduce the swelling. Put them in cold water.” Risotto takes the basket from Prosciutto and sets it down on the floor to get a better look.

“It’s not that bad, because there’s nothing there.” Now free of holding the basket, Prosciutto instinctively goes to shove his hands in his pockets, realizing that his pajama pants that he’s been wearing all day don’t have any.

“You have been hurt. Having functioning hands and fingers are vital for humans.”

“I fucking didn’t.”

“I shall bring you to the faucet that ejects the cold water.”

“No! I said I’m fine, asshole!” Prosciutto snaps.

Risotto seems taken aback, “...Very well. Then I shall bring the cold water _to_ you. Please sit down,” Without another word, he turns on his heel and walks to the kitchen with pitch blackness flaring in his pale scales.

“Risotto—!”

Pesci finally butts in, a rare occasion. “Fra, we rushed home because you wanted to reduce the swelling! So fricking sit down!”

“I…” Prosciutto’s eyes dart around thinking of something to say, “... I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize to me, apologize to him!” Pesci plants his hands on his older brother’s shoulders and guides him to the couch. Then he goes upstairs to do whatever cinnamon rolls do.  
________

A few minutes later, Risotto comes back with a large bowl (that he once deemed useless, now he sees why humans have so much kitchenware) filled with water and some ice, “The water from the faucet was not as cold to my liking, so I rummaged around the fridge and found these minuscule icebergs,” he grumbles.

Prosciutto huffs. “Thank you, Risotto.”

The octopus doesn’t say anything when he sets the bowl down in Prosciutto’s lap, watching the man reluctantly put his bruised fingers into the ice water and shiver. “It’s so fucking cold.”

“That is the point. Is it numbing the pain?” Risotto sits beside the blond, trying his best not to let his well-over-200-pound-weight shift the balance of the couch cushions.

“I guess…” The blond mumbles.

“Good.”

The dreaded awkward silence falls over them like a suffocating blanket again. Prosciutto hates it enough to set aside his ego.

“...I’m sorry for snapping at you and calling you an asshole.” He huffs out.

“It is alright, I understand. Thank you for apologizing.” Risotto responds simply.

“You’re really that quick to forgive me?” Prosciutto is a bit surprised.

“A straightforward and simple apology is enough to suffice, but I am more worried about your well-being, Prosciutto.”

“I’ll be fine now. You can go eat your lunch, Risotto.” Prosciutto motions his head to the crabs in the basket.

Risotto blinks, “I find you far more significant in my life than a handful of crabs for consumption,” and rests his head on top of Prosciutto’s.

“...Jesus Christ, can you make my heart beat any faster?” The blond mumbles with a smile.

“I can certainly try.” The baritone chuckles out. The vibrations of his voice send tremors down Prosciutto’s spine.

Of course, Risotto notices. He hums in his throat a tune he had learned from the music Formaggio introduced him to.

Prosciutto perks up a bit. “That’s a rather lovely tune, what song is that?”

“Formaggio said it is called _Fade to Black_ by _Metallica._ It is one of my favorites from the album, besides _The Call of Ktulu._ It speaks to me on a deep level.” 

“Really?” His azure eyes widen slightly, “I thought heavy metal didn’t sound that… good.”

“Perhaps you should listen to some with me later on. I find it very pleasing.” The goth and now metalhead suggests.

“Maybe…” The Italian man takes the bowl of ice water off of his lap and on the floor in front of him. Risotto, now that his waist is exposed, takes the opportunity to wrap his big scaly arms around it.

“Risotto!” Prosciutto’s face goes pink.

“You asked if I could make your heart beat any faster. Is it working?”

“You know what? Yes. Yes it is.”

“...would you like me to unhug you?” Risotto inquires.

Prosciutto answers his question by holding the monstrous but gentle hands settled on his waist. “Not a chance, _tesoro.”_

 _”Tesoro?_ I have not heard of that word before,” Risotto asks with a slight tilt of his head, “What might that mean?”

Prosciutto looks up at him grins wide, showing a subtle gap between his two front teeth. “It means treasure in Italian, Risotto. You are my treasure that I found in the sea.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> He hasn’t realized The Call of Ktulu named after his grandfather because of the spelling and pronunciation.


	16. Cuddlefish

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Risotto is an excellent, quality boi. Solid 12/10.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A lot of people irl ask me how weird can I get. Well

_Prosciutto opens his eyes, hazy and heavy. He knows he’s dreaming again with the strange glowing sigils and alien architecture surrounding him in an underwater civilization, so he just lays passively as that same fucking current pulls him away, hella pissed off at the situation._

_Before he knows it, he stands before the one and only Cthulhu who, quite frankly, looks far happier(?) than he did the last time they met._

_“I see that you have followed my first instruction with Risotto, pitiful mortal. I could feel his sheer jubilance as he consumed the crabs.” The Great Old One bellows, pleased with the _Homo sapien_ before him._

_“You’re welcome…?” Despite them already meeting, Prosciutto is shaking in his nonexistent boots from fear._

_“Now, do you remember what I said next?”_

_“You said… to brush his scales?”_

_“Yes! Oh, you are such a clever little mortal.”_

_“Ok, but what the hell do I brush him with!?”_

_As if on cue, a scrubbing brush drifts down from the endless chamber’s ceiling._

_“The fuck?” Prosciutto looks up to see nothing but darkness._

_“Brush him well. It is good for his hygiene, plus it is also good for your bonding with him.” With that, Cthulhu waves goodbye and Prosciutto can feel the world around him fade away…_

The blond rises from bed, about to rub his eyes only to find the same brush from his dream in his hand. At this point in his life, he’s stopped asking questions about all this weird shit.

Risotto isn’t sleeping by his side. He must’ve woken up already to eat some poor dead fish in the lonely coldness of the refrigerator. Prosciutto sets the brush down next to the abalone shell on his dresser, straps his prosthetic leg in place and heads downstairs.

Prosciutto was right— there are bits of fish bones scattered in the trash bin and a Risotto Nero preparing breakfast for him. 

“Good morning, Risotto.” Prosciutto yawns.

Risotto perks up upon seeing him. His tail sways in greeting, “Good morning, Prosciutto. Did you sleep well last night?” He slides two sunny-side up eggs onto a plate, along with a slice of toast.

Prosciutto contemplates on whether he should tell Risotto about his great grandfather for a moment, “I had a strange dream, but other than that it was good.”

“Was it a dream caused by The Great Old One Cthulhu?” Risotto asks nonchalantly and places the breakfast down on the dining table, “If so, I will talk to Him.”

“...Sigh. Yes, yes it was,” The blond sighs exasperatedly and, to add a dramatic flair, he runs a hand through his loose hair, “That’s why I knew all of a sudden that you love crabs. Not because I’m a fucking psychic or anything.” 

“Oh! That makes much more sense.” Risotto, with a gentle hand on his waist, guides Prosciutto to his seat. 

Prosciutto hums in response. “Thank you for the breakfast, tesoro.” 

Hearing that nickname makes the gothopus’s face turn pink, so he too grabs a chair and sits down before he stumbles from being flustered. Prosciutto laughs— goddammit, that cute fucking laugh. It gets Risotto right in the eldritch heart every time.

“So,” Prosciutto says after swallowing a bite of egg, “Last night, the so-called Great Old One bestowed me a gift for bringing you crabs.”

Risotto shoots him a look. “Do not believe His lies. That book he gifted to you is used to summon the indescribable—”

“No no no! It’s for me to use on your body—,” That’s a terrible way to word it, ”Ok, he gave me a scrubbing brush because it’s good for your hygiene.” 

The octopus monster pauses, his limited expressions changing from suspicion to embarrassment, furrowed brows shifting to averted eye contact.

“What’s wrong?”

“I am… I am not a hatchling anymore. I can scrub my old scales off without aid.” He insists with defiance in his tone, almost sounding embarrassed.

“Well… he _also_ said it’s a good bonding exercise for the two of us.” 

At that notion, Risotto Nero goes from a grumpy octopus to a happier octopus.

________

Prosciutto looks down at the brush in hand, then at the Risotto standing in the living room. “How is this supposed to work?” 

“Simple, just brush off the dead scales.” Risotto states. 

“Doesn’t that mean you’re supposed to…” Prosciutto’s words cling to his tongue. One, Risotto is taking off his coat. Two, holy shit, Risotto is taking off his coat. 

The slight iridescence to his scales makes the scene look like its from a shitty vampire romance movie; the sunlight sifting from the outside hitting every part of his body just right, every curve of his toned and strong muscles now in their full bare glory, and now 100% of his prideful chest is out in the open. And, for an added sparkly effect, the metal piercings on his Lovecraftian nipples shine.

The fact that God hasn’t stuck him dead yet makes Prosciutto question his faith.

Risotto reaches for his hat to strip himself of, then his belt buckle to remove his dumb Hot Topic pants too, then the blond snaps out of his daze to grab his wrist. “Leave that on!” 

“You are blushing again, Prosciutto.” The octopus teases with a grin tugging at the edges of his hidden beak.

“Am not! Now sit down!” The blond’s bottom lip sticks out in a pout. A very kissable pout, mind you. 

“As you wish, you strange human.” Risotto says with a graceful flop onto the couch, lying face down with his draconic wings tucked snugly to his sides and his head hidden in his arms. Huge back muscles: exposed.

Prosciutto kneels on the floor and tentatively places the brush on the middle of Risotto’s scaly back, unsure of what exactly what to do. He opts to start brushing the oversized puppy’s back before him like a dog, starting from between his shoulders down to the base of his tail.

Dry, duller bits of scale flake off of Risotto’s body like a lizard’s sheddings. It’s sort of gross, but at least they’re not slimy or anything. Prosciutto has touched Risotto’s body before anyway, so it’s not _that_ weird.

The muscles in Risotto’s back relax after several strokes, a deep and content sigh with a sway of his tail hanging off of the couch’s armrest. Prosciutto takes this as a sign that he is indeed doing a good job, ignoring the mess that he now has to clean up. 

“Is this like a massage to you, Risotto?” Prosciutto asks once he stands to begin scrubbing his tail. Now that Risotto is not wearing his coat, Prosciutto can approximate that his tail is about as long as Risotto is tall. It’s a miracle he’s knocked over so little with it.

The octopus monster mumbles in response. “With your hands, it is best massage.” 

“When I asked you earlier, Risotto… you said that you were a hatchling once?” Prosciutto decides to pry a bit into his life, considering he didn’t want to learn about him before. 

“There was a time where I was small, small enough to be cradled in your arms after I hatched from my egg,” Risotto replies, “But, my head was... embarrassingly large in comparison to my body, and my tentacles were short and stubby. I also had a pudgy belly.”

“It sounds like you were absolutely adorable back then. As you are now.” Prosciutto chuckles at the thought of a baby Risotto. He continues working down his tail to the end, which is flattened out vertically like a paddle.

“I am not adorable. I am sexy.” Risotto insists. 

“Fine, then. You’re both adorable _and_ sexy.” 

“...I suppose I can accept that answer.” 

The Italian man smiles and gets the last bits of shedding off of his monster boyfriend. “Satisfied, tesoro?”

Risotto turns himself over onto his back and sits up without answering Prosciutto’s question. He pats the spot where he was just laying insistently with his puppy eyes. Pat. Pat. Pat. _Pat. Pat. Pat!_

“...Ok?” Prosciutto assumes he wants him to sit, so he sits. 

Risotto does not fucking hesitate to lay his squishy head into Prosciutto warm lap, looking up at the blond with love in his eyes. “Now… now I am satisfied.”

“Tesoro, you could’ve just asked!” Prosciutto playfully scolds him, flicking his forehead and gets rewarded with a squeak. 

“I did not feel like asking.” He answers simply.

“What now? Does the adorable little octopus want some head scratches?” Prosciutto baby talks him.

“Do not speak to me like I am a hatchling. That was 27 years ago.” He grumbles.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” Prosciutto places a hand on the top of Risotto’s head, kneading the softness gently. The R’lyehian makes a pleased, relaxed sound, his crimson eyes fluttering shut at the sensation.

“Prosciutto, your touch is simply godlike.” Risotto mumbles, his once slightly writhing tentacles ceasing their wiggles. 

“Grazie, Tesoro.” Like how he does with Pesci, Prosciutto places both hands on the sides of Risotto’s squishy face for a full-on facial massage. This greatly pleases the Lovecraftian being; he shows his appreciation with the strange but happy noises he’s making.

Risotto has gone completely slack now, floppy like a poorly cooked octopus-flavored pancake. Or, as the legend Bruno Buccellati would put it: A condom.

He’s so perfectly relaxed that the tip of his little black beak is poking out between his tentacles. This piques Prosciutto’s curiosity. Pesci has shown his Fra those cute videos of parrots and cockatiels having their beaks scratched, so what if…? 

He pauses the facial massage, reaching his fingertip out and, ever so lightly, scratches the tip of his beak.

Once it starts, Prosciutto feels the couch shaking. His whole body is shaking. Almost like an elder god is tearing through the ground with earthquakes, coming his way to punish him for a forbidden, sinful act. 

“What the fuck!?” Panicked, Prosciutto whips his head around and brings his hands close to his face, but nothing is out of the ordinary. No pictures fall from the walls, no plaster crumbles from the ceiling. 

“Prosciutto. Why did you stop?” Risotto asks innocently, eyes blinking open out of his daze.

“Didn’t you just feel those tremors!?” Prosciutto snaps.

Risotto stares at him confused for a moment, then a lightbulb seems to go off. “Oh. That was my doing. My apologies.” 

“What?”

“Those tremors are my laryngeal muscles rapidly contracting and relaxing to produce vibrations when I am at my most content.”

Prosciutto stares at him even _more_ confused, then another lightbulb goes off. “So basically you’re fucking purring?”

“What is a purring? Or is that what you humans call it?”

“You know what? Never mind.” Prosciutto sighs, starting to understand that he will never fully understand Risotto. He continues to give him his beak scritches, however.

“Oh, sweet mother of Azathoth. Yeeeeessssss…” Risotto literally purrs out in pure bliss. Prosciutto has had a purring cat in his lap before, but not one with sexy muscles that could easily crush a boulder if he wanted to. 

He scratches the underside of his beak and Risotto goes totally off-the-shits bonkers. Tail thrashing in joy, leg kicking up in the air, the whole couch is quaking in fear of his laryngeal muscles. He’s making little chirping noises with a little tongue poking out of his beak, all forms of coherent speech is gone thanks to a mere scratching from a mortal. 

This is the dangerous, indescribable spawn of the Great Old One destined to consume the world in madness, ladies and gentlemen. 

Prosciutto hasn’t had a bigger _What The Fuck™_ moment since first meeting Risotto. He _knew_ Risotto would be weird, but he really wasn’t expecting a dog/cat/bird/lizard in one package. 

The blond moves his hand away for a moment to take in Risotto’s happy face. Eyes closed, deep purring in content, perfectly relaxed—

Mere milliseconds after the scratching stops, the tentacles on Risotto’s face begin to writhe. They reach out in search of something until finally, the many suckers latch onto to Prosciutto’s hand. They feel like lots and lots of little kisses!

“What are you doing?” Prosciutto asks, suddenly wary.

Risotto does not answer. With one eye open, he uses his appendages to drag Prosciutto’s hand back to his beak. One tentacle lays itself on top of Prosciutto’s index finger and starts moving it for automated beak scratches.

“Risotto…” Prosciutto can’t stop himself from smiling, “I can’t keep giving you scratches forever.” 

“...why not?” Both of Risotto’s eyes open, pupils expanding for that cuteness factor. 

“Well, what if my hand gets tired?”

“Humans have evolved two hands. Use your other one if one gets tired.” With that observation, his tentacles let go of Prosciutto’s hand and reach for his other. His hand is now covered in small red sucker marks.

Prosciutto retorts by crossing his arms, now his hands are tucked safely away from the horrible clutches of the Kraken. “What am I going to get out of this besides tired fingers?”

“My love for you.”

“I’m going to get that no matter what, you dork!”

“That is true. How about I clean up the mess from all of that brushing earlier? Or perhaps I shall prepare you… your favorite chicken parmigiana? I will do both if you keep scratching me for a while longer.” Risotto suggests.

“If you can add ‘your love for me’ to that too, I’ll give you scratches until the evening. Deal?”

“Deal.”

With that, Prosciutto smiles and leans down, pressing a sweet kiss at the tip of Risotto’s beak. 

“I love you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It’s been over a month since I last updated this fic? WACK


	17. A Sucker for Knowledge II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Risotto gains more knowledge of the human world.

_It’s the dream world again: The strange architecture, the glowing sigils, and some fish and squid swimming around. Prosciutto doesn’t even bother with trying to fight it. He’s so done. All he wanted was a nice, sexy dream involving a certain tentacle monster but no._

_Once again, Cthulhu is awaiting his arrival in his chamber. “Well done, pitiful mortal. You have completed your second task. Risotto’s scales now shine like the shimmering seven seas.”_

_“Uh, thanks.” Prosciutto says, tiredly._

_“Your third task is to feed him knowledge. He is a slut for knowledge.”_

_“...what do you want me to teach him, mathematics? I’m not a professor and I don’t think I’m capable of teaching academics.”_

_“No, you insolent fool! Mathematics is disgusting!” Cthulhu roars and Prosciutto nearly shits himself, “...teach him about your kind, and the creatures that roam the surface world. His curiosity must be sated.”_

_“How much should I teach him?”_

_“Yes.”_

_“What the hell does that even mean…?”_ And before Prosciutto knows it, he’s awake in bed. 

Risotto is behind him, arms wrapped around his waist and soft head buried in the crook of Prosciutto’s neck. The Elder Being snores peacefully, still far in the dream world. The morning rays shift through the curtains and the birds outside sing their melodious songs.

Prosciutto should get on with his sacred task. But perhaps… there are more important things than going to the library right now.

Prosciutto wiggles a bit, turning on his side to face Risotto Nero. He cups Risotto’s cheek and gives a slow stroke with his thumb. 

“Mm…?” Risotto’s eyes flutter open at the contact, pupils wide. Despite being a monster of the deep, he looks so innocent wrapped up in a blanket.

Prosciutto smiles sweetly. “Good morning, tesoro. How was your sleep?” 

“Simply amazing.” Risotto responds. 

“That’s great!” Prosciutto sits up and swings his legs over the side of the bed. He slips on his prosthetic, “Well, your grandfather gave me another task to do, so I have to go get what I need.” 

“Wait!” Risotto grabs his wrist, “Do not leave yet.”

“Why not?”

“...I wish to make frittata for breakfast with you.” 

____________

Bell peppers, salami, spinach, mushrooms, and cheese: Prosciutto’s favorite ingredients to put in a frittata. Risotto chops up the ingredients very carefully with a knife like he’s performing surgery. Prosciutto tosses them around in the hot pan like a real chef. 

Risotto watches in fascination as Prosciutto beats the eggs so smoothly without making a mess. His precision is sexy. Then, he pours the eggs into the pan, fries it and adds some more cheese on top. 

“Risotto, could you open the oven for me?” Prosciutto asks him. Risotto does so, and the heat wave that hits his face makes him flinch and squeak in surprise.

Prosciutto pops the frittata into the oven and Risotto closes the door. And now they wait.

The R’lyehian looks around the kitchen, clueless. “...What will we do now?” 

Prosciutto ponders to himself for a moment. Maybe he should… gauge Risotto’s interest.

“We have about 15 minutes on the stove timer…” Prosciutto leans on the kitchen counter, crossing his legs and giving Risotto a side look he’s never seen him express before, “15 minutes to do _whatever_ we want.”

“...Yes? That is why I am asking what we will do?” Risotto reiterates his earlier question.

“What I’m saying is…” Prosciutto steps towards the monster, “I love you so much and… Fuck, you’re so damn attractive. Seeing your muscles in full yesterday and, fuck, I just...” The blond’s face is flushed with pink. He traces a finger up between Risotto’s cleavage. 

Risotto also gives Prosciutto a side look, but with a completely different energy. “You just…?”

“I just… think we should take things a little further since we have some time? If you’re comfortable with that, uh, I don’t know what your kind’s policies are on interspecies… you know...” Prosciutto starts to mumble as he’s finally expressing some more… intimate feelings he has for Risotto. 

Risotto blinks. “How further? What are you talking about?”

Prosciutto’s face bursts into red and he pouts. “How innocent are you!? I’m saying that we should have sex! Not hardcore stuff or anything just… ugh!” He means romantic, candlelit vanilla stuff. 

Risotto scoffs. “I am not innocent. B stands for Bondage, D stands for Dominance or Discipline, S stands for—”

“Who taught you that!? Melone!?” Prosciutto’s face couldn’t get any redder.

Risotto looks down at the outfit he’s wearing and back up to Prosciutto. His stupid, kinky leather coat. “You tell me if I didn’t know what BDSM stood for before coming to the surface world.” He says with sarcasm; something that Prosciutto unwittingly taught him. 

The Italian man’s lips set in a straight line to hide his expression. “Ok. You win.”

Risotto chuckles smugly in victory. 

Prosciutto grumbles, looking at Risotto up and down at his stupid kinky coat. “...haven’t you been wearing that coat since you’ve gotten here? A month…?” And now that he thinks about it, it smells like seaweed and seawater.

“Yes. Why?”

“Is that the only thing you wear?”

Risotto hums in thought before answering. “Truthfully? I am one of the very few R’lyehian citizens who wear clothing. Additionally, this is my only outfit and I have been meaning to get more coats like this…” 

Prosciutto thinks about giving Risotto spare clothing, but nothing either him or Pesci wears could possibly fit this massive lad of a man. He’ll add the clothing store to his list of errands for the day…

____________

After a hearty breakfast and a kiss goodbye, Prosciutto sets out on his quest. 

The first arc of his quest shall be the library. He pulls into the parking lot in the handicapped spot. He hops out of his old 1970 Impala Chevrolet (that he barely uses other than to drive to the store or a friend’s house) and hobbles inside. It’s nice to go out once in a while, Prosciutto thinks so himself. 

He looks through the nonfiction shelves, wondering what wonders of the world he shall teach Risotto. Cthulhu never specified what exactly he should educate his monster boyfriend on… an even better question is if Risotto would prefer a picture book over an encyclopedia. 

Prosciutto simply grabs whatever catches his eye in the nonfiction section, on all subjects ranging from insect ecology to ancient civilizations. He goes for the ones with an equal balance of words and pictures. He’s sure Risotto would appreciate a visual. 

The librarian gives Prosciutto a questioning look as to why he’s checking out at least ten books, but that’s none of their business. 

Then Prosciutto is off to the mall for clothing, a splendid journey full of shitty Italian drivers and a lot of aggressive hand gestures across the roads. Prosciutto tries to keep his cool, but he can’t help but yell, _“VAFFANCULO!”_ at people who cut him off.

Once Prosciutto is safely in the mall, he hops from store to store looking for clothes that 1.) Fit Risotto and 2.) Are within Risotto’s tastes. He passes by many women’s and men’s boutiques alike, but none of them seem like things Risotto would want to wear.

Then the blond sees the Hot Topic. 

The emo cashier wearing a Gir hoodie looks in awe as this man with a bitchy yuppie aesthetic suit strolls into their dark store, hair tight like an office worker and no sign of punk in his blood whatsoever. He’s hilariously out of place amongst the emo teenagers with heavy eyeliner and nose piercings. 

The emo cashier’s jaw drops when Prosciutto places a shit ton of dark clothing onto the counter, “We’ve converted another,” The cashier mutters under their breath. They scan everything without another word and ring up the total. 

Prosciutto pays and strolls right on out, still radiating with yuppie energy. 

______________

Once Prosciutto has opened the front door, Risotto is there waiting for him like a loyal dog. “Hello, Prosciutto! Oh, do you need help with those bags?” 

“That’d be great! Grazie.” Prosciutto says, and Risotto lifts the bags of clothing with great ease. The octopus monster curiously pokes the bags with his many tentacles. 

“I got some new clothes for you! I thought you’d try them to see if you like them… if not, I’ll just return them.” Prosciutto smiles and puts the books down on the couch.

“Ah! I shall do that now.” When Risotto looked into the bag, his eyes lit up in excitement and the tip of his tail waggled. The monster makes haste up the stairs into ~~their~~ Prosciutto’s bedroom and closes the door. 

Twenty long minutes later, Risotto has made up his mind and steps out of the bedroom lookin’ _fresh_ , like I’m talking about crispier than a freshly tossed romaine lettuce salad with croutons. The outfit is far less ridiculous than what Risotto was wearing before and yet twice as stylish: A black leather jacket that’s studded on its sharply angled collar; a Metallica t-shirt beneath that exposes Risotto’s midriff, grayish-blue in color; and ripped denim that shows bits and pieces of his scaled legs, held along his waist by a studded leather belt. Risotto’s dumb hat has been replaced by a simple, dark cotton beanie that fits around his squishy head nicely. 

 

Prosciutto had been so anxious to see what Risotto would look like and what pieces he would choose from the bags. And Lord almighty, Risotto looks like a piece of eye candy. Prosciutto subconsciously chose what Risotto would look sexy in. But… he’d look sexy in anything. 

“I apologize for the wait, Prosciutto,” Risotto says as he steps down the stairs towards him, “I had to cut slits in the shirts and pants with my claw to make room for my wings and tail. I hope you do not mind.” 

“Not at all!” Prosciutto quickly wipes the drool off his lips before Risotto can notice, “What’s more important is that if you _like_ it or not.” 

Risotto’s wings flutter. “I simply feel fantastic in this! This outfit is right within my tastes and comfortable as well. Thank you!” The octopus monster gets onto the couch with Prosciutto, plopping beside him and wrapping his arm around the blond’s shoulders. 

“Oh, you’re welcome tesoro!” Prosciutto nestles himself into Risotto’s bicep, a satisfied hum when he gets comfortable on that sweet, sweet muscle. 

Risotto curiously looks at the stack of books next to Prosciutto. “Ah. I assume grandfather asked you to give me knowledge? He knows me all too well.”

“That’s right,” Prosciutto picks up a book labeled _Insects of Europe_ and hands it to Risotto, “This one is all about bugs. I think you’ll like this one.”

“Interesting!” Risotto sets the book in his lap and opens it. His expression drops.

“What is it, Risotto?”

“...This… is embarrassing, but… I cannot read this language, Prosciutto.” 

“...You’re illiterate?”

“I can read R’lyehian but not these strange human runes. They are foreign to me.”

Prosciutto leans against Risotto’s chest and points to a letter. “Well, this is the letter ‘a’. It can make the ‘ah’ or ‘a’ sound.” 

“Oh? It can make different sounds?”

Prosciutto nods. “It all depends on the accent of the word. Like ‘a’ in ‘apple’ is different than the ‘a’ in ‘haze’.”

“That is very strange,” Risotto comments after a moment of processing, “I would assume there would be a different letter for every different sound.”

“Mhm. But most letters only make one sound,” Prosciutto points to another on the page, “‘M’ will always make the ‘mmm’ sound. ‘T’ will always make the ‘t’ sound. There are very few exceptions besides the combinations of letters. ‘T’ and ‘H’ together makes the ‘th’ sound as in ‘the’.” 

Risotto’s head tilts from side to side like a puppy’s trying to figure out where a mysterious noise is coming from. It’s endearing. 

“‘E’ can make the ‘ee’ and ‘eh’ sound. ‘I’ can also make the ‘ee’ sound, but it can also make the ‘ih’ sound…” After Prosciutto teaches the entire English alphabet to Risotto, he points to a word on the page, “Now you try it! Sound it out,” He looks over at Risotto, whose pupils are dilated wide. 

Risotto then speaks. “B… Bu… Butterfly? Butterfly.” 

“See? It’s not so hard, tesoro.” Prosciutto reaches up and scratches Risotto’s beak as a reward. Risotto squeaks and leans into his touch. 

“Can I try another word?” Risotto asks with a wagging tail. 

“Of course! Try as many words as you can. All you’re doing is associating the letters with the sounds you already know.” The blond smiles. 

“I see,” Risotto’s attention returns to the book, “Le...pido… Lepidoptera. Lepidoptera is an o...order of insects inc...including? Moths and butterflies. They have two sets of veined wings, covered in micro...scopic scales… going through complete meta… meta… Prosciutto, how do you say this word?”

“Metamorphosis.”

“Ah, thank you. Going through complete metamorphosis, starting from egg, larva, chry...salis or cocoon to adult…” 

Risotto’s hand mindlessly wanders down to Prosciutto backside, cupping the small of the blond’s back with ease as he reads aloud. Prosciutto’s own hand reaches over to Risotto’s opposite shoulder, the Elder One’s deep baritone reverberating through his body and lulling Prosciutto into a deep state of relaxation. 

Prosciutto was never particularly interested in insects but hearing Risotto read about them has his full attention. Risotto puts the insect book down after reading pages that catch his eye, picking up another titled _History of Domestication: From Crops to Companions._

“You humans have such fascinating friends,” Risotto comments, “In R’lyeh, we keep horseshoe crabs in our homes.” 

“Really?” That’s something Prosciutto wouldn’t have expected. 

Risotto seems to reminisce about his home life. “They are independent and particularly useful for ridding our homes of worms and other unwanted pests, but they tend to bump into everything. I have one named _N'gha Uh'enyth…_ it means Death Beast.” 

Prosciutto snorts. “So they’re like cats?”

“What are cats like, may I ask?” 

“Cats are independent and particularly useful for ridding our homes of mice and other unwanted pests, but they tend to bump into everything.” Prosciutto tells him. 

“Ah, So cats are terrestrial horseshoe crabs? I never knew that.” Risotto comments. His hand wanders up Prosciutto’s back, his claws combing through his loose blond hair. He’s careful not to scratch Prosciutto’s scalp too hard. Prosciutto’s eyes flutter shut and he hums in delight.

Risotto says each and every word on the pages out loud, encouraged by the light, proud smile on Prosciutto’s face as well as all of these fascinating facts being soaked up in his memory. 

With every book is another subject mastered: From Mesopotamian history, to the Renaissance, to dinosaurs, to how electricity works, to cultural foods around the world, to the many wars of history. He occasionally tells Prosciutto more about his home when the subject at hand makes him recall it.

After reading the book on war, “The Cthulhi race once had a war with the Elder Things, who built their city in the continent you call Antarctica.” 

“What for?” Prosciutto asks.

“I honestly have no clue. What did Elder Things ever do to us besides look derpy?” The Cthulhi shrugs.

Risotto puts the book down before picking up the last one that’s simply titled, _Human Anatomy._ He flips through it, deeply interested in the inner mechanisms of _Homo sapiens._ Now he finally understands that the human circulatory and digestive system weren’t connected in the way he thought they were before.

Prosciutto notices that Risotto makes a funny face once he hits the human reproductive system page, “What’s up? Never seen a dick before?”

“I have, I am just surprised that humans only have one penis or vagina instead of two like my kind.” 

“...what?!” 

“Yes. Would you like to see?” Risotto asks smugly.

“We can save that for later!” Prosciutto shouts at the gothopus with the reddest of faces.

“Oh~? Later? Perhaps we should arrange that time to be in the bedroom. _Our_ bedroom.” Risotto flirts as payback from earlier in the day. Risotto laughs when poor Prosciutto buries his face into his chest in embarrassment. He holds Prosciutto dearly and presses sucker kisses to his cheeks.

“You are so adorable, Prosciutto.” Risotto purrs. He puts the book down, gently pushing Prosciutto down onto the couch and nuzzling his head into the crook of Prosciutto’s shoulder. Prosciutto makes a quiet noise, his hands feeling up and down Risotto’s muscular arms and tracing along the scales.

Risotto presses a sucker to Prosciutto’s lips and the round curve of his beak brushes against their softness. Their eyes make contact, beautiful sapphire meeting deep ruby. “I love you so much, Prosciutto.” 

“I love you too, Risotto. _Ti amo.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might. I _might_ write the monster fucking porn to apologize for the delay of this chapter.


End file.
